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sourkive · 10 months ago

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013 : THE STORM.

Starring: Lee Bohyung.

Featuring: Kim Seungsoo.

Summary: Bohyung tries to run away.

Word Count: 2k.

CW: Bohyung makes a flippant comment about suicide, otherwise I think no warnings apply. Feel free to lmk if you notice something!

“I dunno why they always book me for the shitty jobs.” Bohyung mutters. It's the first word he’s said since getting into the car an hour ago.

He can see Seungsoo drumming his fingers against the steering wheel. He bites at the corner of his lower lip, chin jutting out just slightly. Bohyung knows these habits; knows them from the afternoons when Minwoo stumbles home in the clothes he’d gone out the night before in; or when Jade goes to bed without cleaning up his usual bombsite of ingredients in the kitchen. It's the face Seungsoo makes when he’s forcing himself not to be a parent and yell.

“Are you going to be like this when we get there?” Seungsoo asks. Bohyung rolls his eyes, staring out of the car window. His knees are tucked close to his chest. They’re winding down a street; some rundown residential area on the outskirts of the city. It's already nine at night, the sky way darker than it should be on the precipice of summer, and the rain falls in torrents, pelting off of the car. It had been storming for hours now, thunder clapping roughly above them. Seungsoo hadn’t fancied the highway in this weather and opted to take the road less travelled; he’d plotted out a route to Daegu that would minimise the amount of highway roads he’d need to take.

Bohyung trusted that they weren’t lost, but he’d lived in Seoul since he was eleven, and he still has no idea where they were.

“Like what?” Bohyung asks; though it comes out as more of a grumble.

“You’ve been scowling for the whole fucking journey.” Seungsoo says. His tone is always dry; his manner of speaking is always rough, and yet, for some reason, today it infuriates Bohyung as if he’s not used to it. As if he hasn’t known Seungsoo since he started training six years ago. As if Seungsoo didn’t sleep in Sour Candy’s dorm five days a week; seven during active promotions. Bohyung liked Seungsoo. But today, he was the last person he wanted to see. And his car was the last place he wanted to be, and some variety show that pulled in some of the worst ratings Bohyung had ever seen was the last thing he wanted to film.

“When we get to work, I'll do my job. If that’s what you’re asking.”

“Wanna talk about what’s bothering you?”

“Why am I doing shows that film in Daegu?” Bohyung asks.

“What?” Seungsoo throws back. Bohyung can already detect irritation in his voice, which is exactly why he never talks to Seungsoo about what’s bothering him. “What does that mean?”

“It means; why the fuck would you film in Daegu, when every fucking TV personality in the country lives in Seoul?”

“That’s not-“

“Nobody even watches this show.” Bohyung says, folding his arms over his knees. He looks down at his feet, tucking his chin in. “And the host is weird.”

“What do you mean ‘weird’?”

“I feel like he’s, like, a pervert or something.” Bohyung says.

“Are there allegations against him?”

“No. It's just his vibes.”

“Well, Valentine usually does background checks-“

Bohyung spits out a meanspirited little laugh. “Is that why we all got hauled into Seobin’s office a week ago and asked if anybody had ever felt us up?”

Seungsoo doesn’t respond, but he does pull to the side of the road; parking against a pavement rowed by a line of old fashioned looking houses. A large field spans the other side, a little playpark haphazardly assembled close to its edge, looking unimpressive and unfinished compared to the span of surface available. The sky is split into fractions by phone lines, each side of the road barred by big wooden poles.

There’s little bits of architecture in the houses that remind Bohyung of the street he grew up on; but then again, they could really be at the edge of any city in the world, on a street like this.

“What’s going on?” Seungsoo asks. “Why are you acting like this?”

“It's nothing.” Bohyung says. Seungsoo looks deeply at him in an awkward and uncomfortable way; and that’s not what this relationship is, and he’s not going to spill his guts to a manager, even if it is his longest lasting one. Seungsoo cares because he’s paid to care. whatever Bohyung says is bound to be reported back. “Keep driving.”

“Not until you tell me what’s wrong.”

“Nothing's wrong.”

“There’s clearly-“

“I'm going to be late for the gig.”

“You don’t care about the gig.”

“Please just drive the fucking car-“

“No, we’re not moving until-“

“Fine.”

Bohyung undoes his seatbelt with a click. Seungsoo’s halfway through telling him not to be stupid when he opens the door and steps out, plunging himself into the torrential rain in nothing but an oversized sweatshirt and a pair of uncomfortably tight skinny jeans he’d quickly grabbed from the laundry and realised too late were Minwoo’s. Minwoo is short, so they sit too high above his ankles, which immediately find themselves dunked into the flooded road, filling his shoes up with water.

In seconds, he’s drenched. Whatever possessed him to do this, he regrets it immediately, but he can’t exactly get back in the car now. So he slams the door shut and sets off, storming down the middle of the road and ignoring Seungsoo as he gets out of the car in turn and hollers his name.

“Get back in the fucking car- there’s phone lines everywhere, Bohyung, you’re gonna get fucking struck by lightning-“

“Whatever.” Bohyung calls out without looking back, continuing to wade his way down the street on his pilgrimage to nowhere; the rain battering down hard against him as he marches aimlessly down the road; clinging his clothes to his skin and plastering his hair to his forehead. Behind him, he hears a sigh and quick footsteps. “People don’t just fucking get struck by lightning.“

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Seungsoo catches up to him in no time, grabbing him by his shoulder. Bohyung tries to pull forward, but Seungsoo is much stronger than him, fingers digging into him as he forces him back around. “Do you know how electricity works?”

“Yes, but nothing like that would ever happen to me,” Bohyung grumbles, stretching his arms out to his sides. He puts a few footsteps between them, a hand raising to tug his bangs out of his eyes in frustration. “I’m not going to get struck by fucking lighting, I'm not going be kidnapped and murdered, I'm never going to be in a plane crash. I probably won’t even kill myself.”

“Bohyung.” Seungsoo looks at him with a furrowed brow, concern heavily on his features. “I don’t know if you’re having a psychotic episode or something, but you can get hurt the same as anybody else.”

“Well, god has made it pretty clear by now that I’m not interesting enough for a death anybody would pay attention to.” Bohyung says. He says it as if it’s fact; because he truly does believe it, though it aches his chest to say it out loud; each word a knife that slits his throat on its way out. “I’m gonna, fucking… die in my sleep as a lonely old man and never be found.”

“Alright.” Seungsoo sighs. He rubs his face, fingers pushing underneath his glasses, which are likely impossible to see through at this point. He pulls them off, hands dropping to his sides. “I hate to break it to you, son, but you’re famous. You got a lot of fans. You have your parents, right? Your sister? You have that boy from your old label. Quite frankly, I’d mourn you if you died. I know you and the other boys are going through some growing pains right now, but there’s no need for all this.”

Bohyung gives a weak smile, and so much is bubbling inside of him that he just can’t phrase and that he knows Seungsoo will have a rebuttal to; that his parents had tossed him into the industry the second they found out he could sing and barely called if they didn’t need money, that his sister would adore the sympathy, that Chiwon had been better off without Bohyung for a long time now, that Seungsoo would be assigned to another artist or find another job and forget all about him. And he thinks about fans and it splinters him a little, that he just doesn’t care about them; and he says;

“I don't want to do this anymore.” It’s quiet, and Seungsoo is quiet too, and for a while it’s nothing but the rain hammering against the pavement, clattering like a sick anticipatory applause for Bohyung’s grand finale.

“Do what?” Seungsoo asks.

“This.” He gestures around him as if the street he’d stormed down had any meaning. It hadn’t; he’d just gone where his feet had taken him, like always. Something opens the floodgates though; and suddenly he’s just talking, each sentence getting more and more breathless as his volume increases, voice cracking as his throat constricts and his eyes well with tears. “I don't want this. i don’t want to wake up and get in a car and drive the length of Korea just to stand in the basement of a broadcasting station and pretend to laugh at the physical comedy of a middle aged man. I don’t want to get on stage and pretend to fucking cry at every stupid arbitrary music show win you rig for us. I don’t want to thank a company who can’t even protect us from creeps. I don’t want to listen to the other three’s melodramas anymore- And it’s gonna make me sound horrible, but to be honest, I don't want to play backup dancer for Harin either, not when I can sing circles around him.”

“Bohyung…” above them, the thunder claps; the sky flashes with lightning and Seungsoo flinches, but nothing strikes. “Things are tough right now, but-”

“They’re not, though!” Bohyung cries out, with a bitter laugh. The tears fall from his eyes, the thunder rumbling darkly just as they make their maiden plummet from his bottom lashes. The second flash of lightning is brighter still; the rain is pooling by their feet and soaking through the canvas of Bohyung’s vans, though he’s far too into this now to worry about conductivity. Now that he’s started, he can’t stop himself from crying. “They’re no tougher than they’ve ever been. I started training when i was eleven fucking years old and it has never not fucking sucked.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

“It was shitty cause V.o.X were failing and then it was shitty because we broke up, and then I came here and trained for five more fucking years and Sour Candy debuted and didn’t fail and yet I still feel like this, every single day. And it has nothing to do with the other boys and it has nothing to do with success or pressure, I just don’t want this! I don't want to be here! I know that it’s gonna fuck everything up if I leave, I know that it’s selfish and it’s going to cause huge problems for the others, and I know that I made a fucking commitment but I just don’t care. I’ve never cared. I need out of this fucking industry because all it’s ever done is ruin me and i don’t- fucking- want to do this anymore!”

Seungsoo pulls his hoodie tighter around his body, frowning. “Do you mean all that?” he asks.

Bohyung doesn’t think there’s any turning back when he nods his head, pursing his lips as a sob rattles his chest. And Seungsoo, grumpy, gruff Seungsoo who’d always been so concerned with masculinity he wouldn’t even let himself laugh at Jade��s inappropriate jokes, pulls Bohyung into his chest, arms wrapping tightly around his back.

Bohyung feels himself break, and then he’s sobbing into Seungsoo’s chest; loud and vocal, snotty and embarrassing. Seungsoo just holds him, rubbing his hand across the span of Bohyung’s back. It's rough and uncertain but it’s something.

By the time they’re back in the car, their clothes are so thoroughly soaked through that Bohyung shivers so hard his jaw chatters against itself.

“Hair and makeup are going to have a fit when they see you.” Seungsoo says, cranking up the heat in the car. Bohyung gives a soft snort just to acknowledge that Seungsoo had spoken. He looks down at his fingers as they quake and thinks that, moreso from being cold and wet, he’s shaking from the crash of finally getting the world off of his shoulders.

“Yeah.” he says. “Sorry.”

“Just be extra nice to everyone today.” Seungsoo says, starting the engine. “I know it’s the last thing you want to do. But get through today. I'll take you to speak to Seobin tomorrow. I’m not gonna lie to you, Bohyung, they’re not gonna let you out of your contract. The best thing I can get you is a break. But you’re gonna need to go on the tour, when it comes. It’s too late to redo everything.”

Bohyung doesn’t answer straight away. For a few seconds, he’s hit by a wave of disappointment. He’d really thought Seungsoo would help him leave, and he wants to argue some more, or get frustrated at Seungsoo and accuse him of not taking his feelings seriously. He swallows all of that, though, because he knows that he’s right, and just says, “thanks, hyung.” He did sign a contract, after all. And it wouldn’t be fair on the other boys. Even though, in the long run, he knows well they’d be fine without him. That was the problem all along.

“Y’know, kid,” Seungsoo starts. Bohyung turns his head to look at him, an eyebrow raising when he sees a hint of a smirk on his face. “Maybe next time you want to accuse your friends of being melodramatic, wait until you’re not crying in the rain about how God doesn’t care about you.”

Bohyung laughs a genuine laugh. It does sting his pride, but he’d woken up this morning feeling like he’d never laugh again.

So he’ll take it.

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sourkive · 10 months ago

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002 : PLAY PRETEND.

Starring: Lee Bohyung.

Featuring: Park Chiwon.

Summary: Bohyung keeps a secret.

Word Count: 1k.

CW: There's just smut from the very beginning. They play with the idea of exhibitionism but nobody can actually see them. Bohyung has feelings for somebody else.

Bohyung’s skin is burning so hot, he’s shocked it doesn’t sizzle when his forearm presses against the cool glass of the hotel window. The room is so high that he’s on top of the world, and below is a beautiful view: one that Bohyung may have appreciated, were his mind currently able to function.

His voice is ragged, choking out moans that twist at the end, pitching up in ways his low voice isn’t used to. It cracks and breaks, and he would be humiliated if anybody else was bringing those noises out of him. But this was Chiwon, and Chiwon had heard much worse from Bohyung’s mouth. Bohyung has always prided himself on being a pillar of stability, stoic until the end, graceful and dignified. But what always took him off guard about Chiwon- and perhaps it shouldn’t, since Bohyung had accumulated so much experience with him over the years, was that he was really big. Really big. Bohyung didn’t want to investigate this aspect of his personality too deeply, but there was something about feeling like he was one too-hard thrust away from being split in two that just undid him; and Chiwon had long since intuited that.

“I've been thinking about this all week,” Chiwon grunts out, his hips snapping roughly against Bohyung’s ass, the sound of skin on skin filling the room almost as loudly as Bohyung’s broken cries. Bohyung wants to reply, and wants to tell Chiwon that he has, too, but words don’t come to him. Chiwon is so deep inside of him, fucking him up against the hotel room window. He’s going hard and fast, like he always does, and when Bohyung’s knees finally quit wobbling and just buckle, a strong arm wraps tightly around his waist, pulling his back flush against Chiwon’s body and keeping him on his feet.

“Look down.” Chiwon mutters in his ear. He takes a step forward, pushing Bohyung’s body with him, until he’s pressed flush against the cool glass, his chest flattening against the surface. He whimpers a little, not fully registering the instruction until a large hand strikes his ass. it’s not too hard; but it stings just enough to send a jolt of interest through Bohyung’s body.

Bohyung trusts Chiwon. he’s trusted him ever since they gave one another their first kisses as trainees, wrapping their fingers together and hearing the fireworks go off in the empty dance studio after hours. Things had gotten quiet after Bohyung left HMT, with no proximity to one another it was easy for the chemistry to fizzle out. But then, a few months ago, Chiwon had debuted again, and they’d locked eyes at Music Bank and found themselves doing this again, phone calls, late night car dates, booking hotel rooms in their home city just to fuck in. When he was younger, Bohyung thought he would be in love with Chiwon forever.

“Look down.” Chiwon repeats, and Bohyung does this time. The room is too high up to see anybody on the ground; which was the only reason they could risk something like this, but realism didn’t matter. It was fantasy, and it’s no less hot when Chiwon leans in, talking in Bohyung’s ear in a low, dark voice, so different to his usual jovial manner. “The whole city’s down there, baby. So easy for them to look up and see what a little whore you are.”

Nobody can see them. Bohyung knows that, but his whines still grow sharper, a hand curling around the top of Chiwon’s forearm. Chiwon takes no pity even as tears fall from Bohyung’s eyes, just pushes him tighter against the window, pounding him with unrelenting force and pace. And there has always been so much in Bohyung’s head, a constant tornado of anxiety and good posture and perfecting the mask of the boy next door. Chiwon understood better than anybody that sometimes, Bohyung just needed to be slapped around and called a dirty slut; and Bohyung once thought he might be in love, but now he’s really just here for the rough sex and giant cock.

“i’m gonna-” Bohyung doesn’t have to finish the sentence, just the start of it has Chiwon going faster, losing a little rhythm but hitting the sweet spot with every thrust. It’s a final stretch, and shortly after Bohyung’s orgasm whitens the edges of his vision and rings his ears so loud he can’t even hear the cry he feels his throat vibrate with, Chiwon is burying his face in Bohyung’s shoulder and groaning deeply and brokenly in turn.

They give themselves a minute or two, Bohyung feels Chiwon kiss along the span of his shoulders before slowly, carefully pulling out. Bohyung mourns the fullness, hand steadying him on Chiwon’s bicep as he hobbles to the bed, collapsing face first with a ragged sigh.

“I was gonna clean you up.” Chiwon says with a laugh. “But now you’ve just spread it all over the bedsheet.”

“Window too.” Bohyung says with a groan, tucking his arms underneath his head. There's a pause, presumably as Chiwon looks to the dirtied pane, and then he groans.

“How do we clean that up?” he asks.

Bohyung shrugs. “You wanted to fuck against the window, your problem.” He says with a small laugh. Rolling onto his back, he stretches out his arms. “You can clean up later, hyung. Hold me for a bit.”

Chiwon falls into Bohyung’s open arms with an eager grin. He takes Bohyung’s face in his hands, and presses a kiss to his nose, and he stares down at him with all the affection in the world.

Bohyung could have everything, if he’d let himself truly have Chiwon.

But that’s what makes him not want him. What Bohyung wants is truly unattainable. And maybe he’s an asshole, but if he could, he’d trade Chiwon in in a heartbeat for someone else. Someone in particular, who Bohyung really isn’t supposed to be attracted to. One who’d never see him the way Chiwon does, never fuck him or love him or trust him the way Chiwon does. Bohyung thinks maybe that’s why it’s what he wants.

“How come it’s always so good?” Bohyung asks with a lopsided grin, and Chiwon gives him a shy smile as if he wasn’t just slapping his ass and unabashedly roping Bohyung into his voyeurism kink.

“Cause I love you.” Chiwon says. Because he says it all the time. Even though they’d never really been together. Chiwon told Bohyung he loved him after their first kiss, and he never rescinded it, not even all these years later.

Bohyung doesn’t respond verbally. He responds the way he always does, kissing the part of Chiwon’s neck that he really likes to be kissed, wrapping his legs tight around his waist and rolling their hips together. And in record time, a large hand wraps around his throat and pushes his head down back onto the pillow, and Chiwon has that dark look in his eyes again.

“Already?” He asks with a smirk. “You really are a whore.”

Bohyung up looks at Chiwon with an arch expression and a nod. And he’s able to purge that other face from his mind for a while.

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sourkive · 1 year ago

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FLAGS. Jade Lim.

PLAY PRETEND. Lee Bohyung.

LAMB TO THE SLAUGHTER. Kang Minwoo.

EASY. Kang Minwoo.

SOLITAIRE. Kwon Harin.

INTERMISSION: GOOD OLD DAYS. Kwon Ahin.

LIAR, LIAR, LIAR. Jade Lim.

BAMBI. Lee Bohyung.

PIETY. Kang Minwoo.

HUNDREDS OF LITTLE PRAYERS. Tachikawa Tetsuo.

JAW OF THE BEAST. Kang Minwoo.

WRONG BLOCK. Zhang Junjie.

MUSIC TO FUCK BOYS TO. Jade Lim.

THE STORM. Lee Bohyung.

NOTE : The posts on this blog are not in order. Please navigate using the masterlist above!

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sourkive · 1 year ago

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012 : MUSIC TO FUCK BOYS TO.

Starring: Jade Lim.

Featuring: Song Taejun, Kim Seungsoo.

Summary: The tower falls.

Word Count: 4k.

CW: Smut, investigation into sexual harassment, cheating, threats.

“Jade,” Seobin had said. “Do you promise you’re being honest with me?”

The country had fallen deep into the grasp of summer. Jade had grown up in sunshine, so a little bit of heat should be a cakewalk, but he supposes he’s acclimatized to south korea quite nicely by the sheen of sweat across his forehead, sticking strands of his bangs to his forehead as he messily pushes them out of the way. The large, mint green tinted sunglasses perched upon his nose do little to protect him from the sun, not least by the way he peers over their frames, but they’re fashionable and green, so he’ll wear them.

They’re the only thing he’s wearing.

He lays back on the expensive, pointlessly luxury sun-lounger, one hand behind his head, and looks down at Song Taejun between his legs.

The good thing about Taejun’s too big house in his stuffy gated community was that it was miles until he stumbled upon a neighbor. Jade had taken a liking to summertime in Taejun’s expansive garden. he liked to have Taejun make him pitchers of cocktails as he sunbathed naked. He liked floating around in the pool and playing The Velvet Rope over the speakers as he tried not to ash his cigarettes on the inflatables. In the evenings, he liked to sit outside in his underwear and one of Taejun’s t-shirts, looking at the vogue runway app on his phone or scrolling seven months down Daichi’s instagram. Jade found himself thriving as he basked in the sun of his boyfriend’s gross decadence.

Taejun had joked that Jade liked his garden more than he liked him in the summer. Jade had responded ‘in the summer?’ and didn’t really know if he was kidding or not.

They’d been annoying each other more than they’d been getting along, lately. Jade remembers the beginning, when they’d walk around Seoul and hold hands under the security of nighttime. He once thought that Taejun was a knight in shining armour, finally a man who loved him truly and wholly and had come to sweep him off of his feet to a lifetime by the pool.

Jade had been with Taejun now long enough to see the bulk sum of his flaws. But he loved him. Even when Taejun was driving him up the wall, when he was getting jealous of men Jade barely even knew, when his mean streak cut out whenever Jade started being difficult, Jade loved Taejun - Jade loved Taejun even when he was twenty minutes into bragging about his stupid fucking sports car. Jade had always loved cars, been easily seduced by men with nice ones, even, but song Taejun had taken that interest and trampled it deep into the soil.

But Jade had still listened to the story of some smooth turn Taejun had made around some road, or something, with an attentive spark in his eyes and he’d nodded at all the right moments, because he’s loyal. He’d sat for twenty three minutes, naked in the sun (save for his sunglasses,) still glistening with oil, and listened to Taejun talk about his fucking car and spare nary a glance at him in the process. It wasn’t exactly how he’d planned his day off.

Jade had always been too pretty to bother with subtlety, so as soon as he scored a lull in the conversation, he’d simply said; “You should suck me off.”

Jade loved Taejun and, when they were on each other's wavelength, he loved sex with him too. He was objectively the best Jade had ever had. Maybe it’s a natural talent or maybe it’s pure experience. Either way, Taejun, who Jade really did think was probably the most handsome man he’d ever seen in real life, looked one hundred percent hotter with his lips wrapped around Jade’s cock.

Jade’s stomach twitches as Taejun slowly takes him in. He'd spent at least a minute lapping at Jade’s head, or dipping down to graze his tongue across Jade’s balls. Jade was beyond hard at this point, and he let out a low moan as his cock hit the back of Taejun’s throat, his lips tightening firmly around his width.

Jade watches him as he hollows his cheeks, spluttering a little as he pushes Jade down still, until he is deep in his throat. Taejun’s eyes flutter up to meet Jade’s with a purposeful gleam in them, and Jade can take a hint, so his hands wrap in Taejun’s hair and grip onto him tightly as he begins to thrust his hips.

Taejun chokes, his throat making filthy, wet noises each time Jade thrusts up into it. Jade knows that he’s pushing Taejun’s limits, but a fiery determination burns in Taejun’s eyes and he’s yet to hit Jade’s thigh, which is their signal to stop.

Jade’s hands ball into fists, tugging Taejun’s hair harshly as he holds him steady in place. the angle is a little awkward, Taejun half-off the bottom of the lounger and Jade’s legs open at either side of it, but he can use the leeway of his feet on the ground to angle his hips, fucking deep into Taejun’s throat. Taejun gags around him, and his hand is only halfway to Jade’s thigh when Jade lets up, letting go of his hair and letting himself pull off to catch a breath.

A thick chain of saliva comes with him, though, connected from the tip of Jade’s cock to Taejun’s bottom lip. It breaks as he pulls away, dripping down his chin, but Taejun doesn’t pull away for long. he opens his mouth, tongue spreading out as he tilts his head to the side and licks messily down Jade’s length, kissing loosely back up and taking his head back between his lips.

Jade groans again, leaning back and allowing his eyes to flutter closed as Taejun works him, bobbing his head and fucking him in and out of his throat. He moves quickly and intensely, and Jade is starting to feel his abdomen tightening when Taejun finally pulls off again with a slick pop.

Jade peers down at him and he grins wickedly, pulling himself up onto the lounge properly to straddle Jade, leaning down to take him in a searing kiss. Jade kisses back eagerly, wrapping an arm along the span of his toned back to pull him closer. Taejun ruts his hips downward, and Jade shivers as he feels the weight of Taejun’s hard cock pushing against him through his swimming trunks.

“Wanna go upstairs?” Taejun asks. Jade shakes his head. “No?”

“No.” Jade grins.

He takes him once more in a kiss, his hand reaching down, pushing under the waistband of Taejun’s trunks and gripping one of his plump ass cheeks tightly.

“I’m gonna fuck you right here.”

“Do you want to have kids?” Taejun asks. They’re sitting out by the pool still, but the sun has set. Jade kicks his feet slowly in the water, liking the resistance against his movements.

It was a good day. They’d fucked a lot and then Taejun had made a caesar salad. They had been good. They hadn’t upset each other. It was the type of day that Jade stuck around for.

“Like, right now?” Jade asks. “I think it’s too late, they’re already leaking out of you.”

Taejun snorts, knocking his shoulder against Jade’s. “I'm being serious.”

Jade twists his mouth up. “I don't know,” he says. “I think so, but I'd be scared. I don't know how to be a dad, I never had one.”

“You'd be fine.” says Taejun. he looks up at the sky, but Jade just stares at him. “You had a mom. I don't think it’s that different.”

“I guess.” Jade sighs. He wouldn’t know. Sometimes he wonders what parts of him went missing in the lack of a father, but he has nothing to compare his life to. It had been levied against him, in the past, in cruel remarks; ‘maybe if there was a male presence in your life you wouldn’t be such a fucking fairy.’ Jade doesn’t tend to pay that any mind. He likes being a fucking fairy.

“Do you want to get married?”

He hates when Taejun plays hypotheticals with him, because ultimately, he knows it’s only going to come true for one of them. He looks at the lump of Taejun’s Adam’s apple, the smooth but firm curve of his chest, his big arms. The big ears that endear him so much to Jade, the shaggy bangs falling below his brows and always getting into his big puppy dog eyes. Jade looks at him and his entire chest swells in fondness and pain because he loves him so much and in the rare, fleeting moments in which he’s honest with himself, he knows that this man is going to break him into a thousand pieces and move on.

It’s all so painfully, embarrassingly obvious. Jade is just a quarter-life crisis and Taejun likes him because he’s young, hot, stupid and slutty. He'll expire in Taejun’s eyes by the time he’s twenty five, and then Taejun will find someone his own age. Someone respectable and sophisticated, who’s greatest accomplishment isn’t nailing a jump split on television. He’ll find someone worthy of the title husband. That's who he’ll have kids with, that’s who he’ll sell his stupid mansion and his baseball toys for and move to the suburbs with. Taejun is going to have a perfect life, one day, and he’s going to look back on these years, perhaps with a little guilt, and he’ll remember how good it felt to be fucked on his sun-lounger but he won’t quite be able to picture Jade’s face anymore.

“I hope I get the right to.” Jade deflects. He watches the water ripple against his ankle, leaning his head on Taejun’s shoulder.

“Positive thinking.” Taejun counters. “This is a future where you can. Do you want to marry me?”

Jade is quiet for a second. and then he laughs, pulling his legs from the water and standing up. “This is the part where I sing ‘Somewhere That’s Green,’ right?”

Too much sarcasm drips from his tongue and he winces at himself as he kicks his feet back into his slides and makes his way over to the wooden table on which he’d left his cigarettes. He hears Taejun twist, and he keeps his back to him as he battles with his lighter to conjure enough of a spark to catch.

“Well, you don’t have to be a dick about it.”

“You’re not gonna marry me.” Jade says, finally lighting his cigarette. He takes a deep draw, finally turning to look at Taejun on his exhale and meeting a pair of sad, confused eyes. “You really imagine a future with me?”

“Of course I do.”

“And at our wedding,” Jade says, taking another draw of his cigarette. “Do I get to invite any guests, or will I still be keeping it all secret from my friends?”

There's a long silence, and then Taejun says, “you can be really immature sometimes, Jade.”

“Well,” Jade shrugs. “I'm seven years younger than you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I mean… ninety-nine minus ninety-two-”

“No, what do you actually mean, Jade?”

Jade places his cigarette between his lips, never breaking eye contact with Taejun as he sucks in, something inside him bubbling to a boil. He doesn’t get angry, though, because unlike Taejun, he can control his anger. He speaks as casual as if he’s noting the weather. “I think you’re using me to feel good about yourself, because you’re going to be thirty next year and you have to enlist in a couple of months, and I'm twenty-two and not a citizen.”

Taejun looks hurt. “Why would you think that?”

Jade leans his hips against the table. He doesn’t know why he looks down, but he sees the Nike logo on his slides and he blurts it out before he can stop himself.

“Did you fuck Tetsuo, hyung?”

The silence probably only lasts a few seconds, but they drag on for hours. Taejun’s face looks offended, but Jade can see the guilt in his eyes and it tells him everything he needs to know.

“What?” Taejun finally spits out.

Jade tries to keep it together, tries to stop his hand from shaking as he flicks the ash from his cigarette into the ashtray. “You picked me up, like, two months ago and I walked past him. He'd obviously just had sex and he was wearing your Nike hoodie.”

“I don’t know what you’re-”

“You fucked Tetsuo.” Jade says, in a factual tone. He betrays no emotion. “Fucked him, dropped him off at our building. Told me to come out. Let us pass each other. Picked me up. And then took me home and fucked me too. Right?”

Taejun looks like a cornered animal, his big, pretty eyes begging for mercy, but Jade stares him down. When he realises that Taejun isn’t going to speak, he keeps going.

“I think the most insulting part of all of this is that, after all the time you’ve spent with me, you still fucking think I’m stupid.”

It’s late enough now for the crickets to start their chorus. They don’t change their tone but the longer Taejun sits there, awkwardly twisted around, feet still dangling over the edge of the pool, Jade swears that they reach a crescendo.

“I'm sorry.” Taejun says, eventually.

And the confirmation is the final bullet. Jade physically feels his heart break, splintering down to the ends of every last vein in his body. He chokes out a gasp, stubbing out his cigarette and roughly swallowing down the lump that immediately forms in his throat. It doesn’t stop his eyes from flooding, though.

“Why?”

“I don’t-”

“No, tell me why.”

Taejun takes a deep breath. “I guess… because I could.”

Jade clasps a hand over his mouth as a sob pulls itself past his facade and rattles his body. A tear falls through his fringe of lashes, twinkling down his cheek and burning a path. “Oh,” is all he can bring himself to say.

“Jade-” Taejun says, but Jade just splays his hand out, shaking his head. He just drags his feet back into the house, pulling his jade-coloured glasses off of his forehead and back over his eyes.

“Hey, Jade!” Ikumi greeted him at the studio break room, making a beeline for the coffee machine. Jade had been sitting at the table for about fifteen minutes just to get out of the room; away from Harin in work mode and Minwoo’s perfectionism reaching drill sergeant status. “Has Seobin spoken to you guys yet?”

“No?” That had gotten Jade’s attention. “What about?”

Ikumi turned to lean in the corner of the counter, tucking her pink hair behind her ear. “It was odd.” she’d said. “He took us into his office one by one and asked us about, like, if any of the staff or producers have been inappropriate with us or if we’ve ever been made to feel unsafe or harassed at Valentine.”

“Really?” Jade asked, feeling his mouth go dry.

“He’ll probably get you guys in soon. Ahin said he’s already questioned Tarot. apparently Tetsuo cried.”

Another unexpected good thing about Taejun’s weird, stupid, Willy Wonka mansion is that it’s full of baseball paraphernalia.

With each step, Jade feels his rationale falling away. He's gripped by a weird sort of numbness. He doesn’t care anymore. Doesn’t care about any of it. Doesn’t care about consequences, doesn’t care about whatever retribution may come his way, karmic or personal. And he certainly doesn’t care about Taejun’s feelings. Fuck Taejun. Fuck Taejun. The crickets were Jazmine Sullivan’s heralding violins, now. There was no saving Song Taejun.

It doesn’t take a minute to find a baseball bat. There's one hanging on the wall in the dining room. Jade pulls it from its display and grips the base tightly in his hand. It’s signed; though Jade has no idea who by, he thinks it probably adds a level of salt to the wound. It drags behind him, scraping against the expensive hardwood floors and he moves, past the kitchen and out into the foyer; to the front of the house.

Jade doesn’t know anything about sports. He doesn’t know how to hold a baseball bat, doesn’t know anything about hand placement or proper form. But he must be doing something right, because as he swings the bat from overhead, both hands wrapped tightly around its base, it dents the hood of Taejun’s precious fucking car perfectly.

The alarm shrieks, and so he only gets a few more strikes in before the front door wrenches open behind him. He hears footsteps rushing down the drive, and he deals a blow to the windshield. The bat bounces off of the reinforced glass and he stumbles. Taejun makes use of the misstep and grips him by the arm, yanking him away from the car.

“What the fuck are you doing!?” He screams. “you fucking psychopath!”

Jade tears himself from his grasp, putting enough space between them to point at him with the end of the bat. Tears stream from his eyes, and his entire body is shaking with adrenaline and anger and maybe panic.

He knows that he must look insane, but he really doesn’t care. He's a monster of Taejun’s own making.

“It was ‘cause of you.” He says, in blank comprehension. Taejun just seethes at him. “The investigation. It’s ‘cause of you.”

“I know this must be uncomfortable.” Seobin had said, looking at Jade with a kindly expression that didn’t suit his normally stoic demeanor. “But you have to tell me if any misconduct has taken place.”

Jade had been anxious all day, but when it came time to sit down and be questioned by Seobin, he couldn’t help but be gripped by anger. Jade could take care of himself. He wasn’t a victim.

“I haven't noticed anything.”

“We received a really serious report last week.” Seobin had said. Jade had just looked at him in response, prompting him to continue with a frustrated little shake of his head. “Before we proceed, we need to know the true severity of the situation. I need to find out if this was an isolated incident. has any of the staff, be that management or producers, coaches, teachers- have any of them ever tried to initiate sexual contact with you?”

Taejun had driven Jade out somewhere secluded and fucked him three days after he’d signed his contract.

“No.” Jade had said.

“Have any of the staff ever tried to initiate an intimate or otherwise unprofessional relationship with you?”

Taejun had sat behind him in the bath, slowly massaging the conditioner into his hair, and said ‘you’re mine, right?’ before Jade had even debuted.

“No.” Jade had said.

“Has anyone at Valentine ever spoken to you in an inappropriate manner, even as a joke, that made you feel uncomfortable or unsafe?”

Taejun had called him stupid, called him a slut, a whore, vapid, accused him of gold digging, accused him of fucking someone at the company to get casted, called him worthless, mocked him for agreeing to sleep with him so quickly, called him ugly, needled him about every pound gained or lost, told him that he was untalented, nothing but a pretty face, that he had nothing of value to say and the only reason god had given him a mouth was because his ability to suck a cock was his only redeeming quality.

“No.” Jade had said.

“Jade,” Seobin had said. “Do you promise you’re being honest with me?”

Jade had agreed to be Taejun’s because he meant it. He’d chosen to be in this relationship, and that meant taking the down with the up. he loves Taejun. (He loves Taejun, he loves Taejun.)

“Yes.” Jade had said.

“Jade.” There’s a panic in Taejun’s eyes. “I don’t- You’re not-“

“What did you do?” Jade asks.

“I didn’t-“

Jade bends his arm, making as if he’s going to swing the bat at Taejun. It’s an empty threat, but Taejun flinches and backs away from him. It makes Jade feel powerful, fills his brain with a weird drunken thump of masculinity. “What the fuck did you do!?”

“I didn't mean to scare him!” Taejun yells. His eyes well with tears. “I just tried to kiss him-“

“Kiss who!?”

“Junjie!” Taejun shouts. His hand tears through his hair. “I thought he was- I only tried to kiss him but he fell over when he pulled away and he hurt himself-“

“You’re telling me that the reason my friend’s arm is in a cast right now is because he was trying to get away from you!?”

Taejun keeps babbling, keeps making up excuses for himself but the blood pounding in Jade’s head is way too loud for him to hear. All he can register is the incessant yelping of the car alarm and his own pounding pulse. He's not trying to listen, regardless. The only thing he can think about is Junjie.

Junjie with his twig limbs and his waist the width of a normal person’s neck; Junjie who Taejun completely towers over in stature. He thinks about how much bigger Taejun is than Junjie, he thinks about Junjie falling so hard he fractured a bone in his desperation to get away. He thinks about the man he loves scaring someone like that.

And he thinks of the dark look in Taejun’s eye that night in the club, he thinks about the bruises he’d left on Jade’s hips. He thinks about the stranger who had greeted him with an innuendo, and Taejun’s dirty snicker, and the thousands of pictures of his faceless, naked body on Taejun’s phone. For some reason, he thinks about the nice upperclassman who’d comforted him through a panic attack in the bathroom at his first high school party, only to spread the rumor that Jade had tried to suck his dick and doom him to a lifetime of precedent reputation.

It takes every last drop of effort in his body not to swing the bat at Taejun’s head and keep swinging until he was nothing but unidentifiable mush.

He twists around, bringing the bat down against Taejun’s wing mirror and knocking it from the car in one fell swoop. Taejun lets out a yelp as if Jade has struck him himself, and when Jade turns to look at him, he doesn’t see a man. He sees a pathetic, vague impression of a person, trying his hardest to be a stereotype of a celebrity at the expense of at least three young men with actual fame, actual talent and actual futures.

Jade tosses the bat on the ground.

“Don’t talk to me ever again.” He says, setting off down the driveway, in nothing but his swimming trunks and his sunglasses.

Taejun is too prideful to follow and beg Jade to stay. He's too proud to report the damages on his car, even.

And Jade pities him for that.

He fishes his phone out of his pocket and makes a call.

“Hey, hyung,” he says. “I'm really sorry, but could you come get me?”

��Why were you at Taejun’s?” Seungsoo asks. Jade feels guilty, sitting in his car. He’d tried not to use Seungsoo like a personal chaperone the way that Minwoo did, but the only other person he knew who could drive was Hayana, and he definitely wasn’t close enough with her to ask her to drive to the edge of the city in the middle of the night to pick him up at Taejun’s gate. He’d given him his hoodie and left him alone for the duration of the drive, but Jade had known he would question him as soon as they pulled up outside of the dorm.

He’d prepared for it, but it doesn’t stop his heart from missing a couple of beats as he finally gives his answer.

“I came to have sex with him.” Jade says. Seungsoo blinks, turning to look at him with a shocked expression. Jade shrugs.

“What? Jade-”

“I’ve had sex with him, like, a thousand times. We did it the first time right after I joined the company. We’ve been dating.”

A silence swells in the car, and Seungsoo buries his face in his hands, elbows resting on the steering wheel. “You boys are going to be the fucking death of me.” He says.

“Don’t worry. I just dumped him.”

Seungsoo sighs, looking up from his hands at Jade. The look on his face is beyond exhaustion. “Jade,” he says. “Taejun is close to losing his job right now. He-”

“I know.” Jade says. “Junjie and Tetsuo. I know.”

Seungsoo pauses, before pushing himself back up again, head thumping against the back of the headrest.

“I'd like to tell Seobin.” Jade says.

“Are you sure?” Seungsoo asks, eying him warily. Jade squirms under his gaze. Seungsoo was a great comfort to the other boys, but Jade had joined the company too old to see him as a weird father figure like they do.

“I wanted to date him. I really had strong feelings for him, and I consented to everything we did sexually.” Jade plays with the idea of confessing to the way Taejun had grabbed him and hurt him. He even had Cairo as witness to that. But he can't. He can’t be looked at like that, can’t give them the opportunity to turn it all into something he’s not and force him to accept hard truths that he’s not even ready to process yet. “So, I don’t have anything super serious to report. But he still broke his contract, right?”

“He did.” Seungsoo says.

“So I'll tell Seobin. If it means Junjie never has to come face to face with him again, I'll tell Seobin everything.”

“I can pick you up tomorrow morning, then.” Seungsoo offers. “And take you to the building.”

“Will you come into Seobin’s office with me?”

“Of course I will.”

Jade thanks Seungsoo, and automatically reaches for his pocket for his cigarettes, only to realize that he’d left them at Taejun’s. He feels it crack at him, but he holds it together long enough to drag himself up to the third floor, quietly sneak through the dorm to the bathroom, and peel himself from his clothes.

It’s when the shower starts that he crumbles, loses grasp on all of his pieces and letting them clatter like shrapnel as he falls apart. He sits in the bottom of the tub, head tucked between his knees as the shower batters against his back, and he’s overcome by heaving sobs, tears and snot streaming down his face. He’d never cried like this before, but there’s no dignity to be had anymore, and so he lets himself choke up embarrassing noises and lets his face twist in emotional agony, he can look ugly here, where there’s nobody to see and no record of proof.

Because it hits him, suddenly, that he’d have been presented an inescapable narrative if not for his one sided oath of secrecy regarding his and Taejun’s affair. His friends, the ones he’d love nothing more than to seek comfort in, had no idea that he’d ever been with Taejun, and he resolves to make sure that they never find out. He won’t play a broken doll for anyone. And after what Taejun has done, he knows they’ll make assumptions and he knows they won’t believe him no matter how much he insists everything was fine until it wasn’t.

But he’ll give himself the night to mourn. Mourn the astroturf lawn and picket fence he was never going to get. Mourn the delusion of it all. It was a nice daydream. That’s all it had ever been.

A thousand blind eyes turned, and a beautiful, perfect daydream.

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sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

011 : WRONG BLOCK.

Starring: Zhang Junjie.

Featuring: Song Taejun, Yoo Seobin.

Summary: The tower's foundation is crumbling.

Word Count: 2k.

CW: Sexual harrassment, attempted SA, injury.

Between he and Ahin, Tarot’s production and songwriting was near unrivalled. That had always been their biggest strength; and Junjie’s favourite thing about being a part of the group was the amount of creative control he had been granted as a result of that. They didn’t need any help; but he wasn’t quite so arrogant as to pretend that collaboration couldn’t be an artistically fulfilling thing. He liked it. He liked working with his other members; or with Hayana. Working with Luke had taught him some valuable lessons; and that session had resulted in the bones of Potential Breakup Song, which was still considered Junjie’s magnum opus.

He was fine with collaborating. Just not with Taejun.

Taejun is a loser. Junjie had obviously never been one to gossip; but he’s observant above anything else. He knew that something had happened between Tetsuo and Taejun last year. The way Tetsuo had discussed their studio sessions was just off; there was a giddiness in his voice that didn’t match his usual cool attitude. Tetsuo had been rushing to the studio, limping home, and then all of a sudden his relationship with Taejun frosted right over. After months of making Tetsuo’s solo record together, they treated each other as if they were perfect strangers.

It doesn't take a genius.

And sure, Tetsuo is a grown man who can have sex with whomever he wants; but he’s also Junjie’s best friend. Junjie knows Tetsuo. Tetsuo pretends to be cool about it; to be some free spirit who’ll bend over for any man with a pulse, who’ll give out blowjobs as if they’re handshakes. But he’s a delicate soul with an easily-bruised heart. Men like Taejun run right through men like Tetsuo with no regard for the damage they leave behind.

Junjie may not have much in the way of dating experience, but he’s dealt with plenty of men like Taejun. He’s not like Tetsuo. He’s equipped. He shouldn’t have to be, but he is. Even when Taejun is sitting next to him in the flesh, only the two of them. Because Valentine had gotten it into their head that Taejun, for some reason, had to have a stamp on Tarot’s upcoming full length album.

‘That’s not really my vision,’ Junjie had tried to argue, but Seobin himself insisted that it would be a revolutionary musical pair up. Junjie doesn’t like it one bit. He’d never really considered himself to be much to look at, but he had suspected from the start that it wouldn’t matter. Junjie didn’t talk to Sour Candy much, but he’d heard that Minwoo felt like Taejun was leery towards him, too. A lot of people want to have sex with Minwoo; a far lot more than those who wanted Junjie, but it was enough to make Junjie even more cautious of him.

He’d entered the studio with an anticipation to be hit on. Taejun takes an hour.

“You know something?” He says, as Junjie replays the same sample for the fortieth time, more focused on why it doesn’t sound right than what Taejun’s saying. He grunts in response, and Taejun continues. “I never noticed how cute you are.”

“Alright.” Junjie mutters, dismissively, not looking away from the computer screen. If there was one thing Junjie was near excellent at, it was shooting people down. He'd whittled it down to an art form, he knew when to be gentle, knew when to be flippant and when to be cruel. Taejun wasn’t getting the first one. By all intents and purposes, he was staff and not an artist. Staff were forbidden from doing this; and so it wasn’t Junjie’s responsibility to let him down easily. He should know better.

“Aren’t you going to say thank you?” Taejun asks. Junjie scoffs. Okay. Flippant doesn’t work.

“For what?” Junjie asks.

“I complimented you.”

“Because you’re trying to get into my pants.”

“And what if I am?”

“I mean,” Junjie tugs his headphones fully off, dropping them around his neck. He turns to look at Taejun, so he can see the look in his eye and know that he’s being deadly serious as he says; “Frankly, i’d sooner hang myself.”

There’s a pause. Taejun doesn’t say anything at first, just stares Junjie down. Something flickers in the back of his eyes, and so Junjie narrows his as if to challenge him. That's when Taejun breaks into a smirk. He lets out a couple of little chuckles; but Junjie keeps his face blank.

“I think you’re playing hard to get.” Taejun says. Junjie feels a frustration build inside of him, and he barks out a mean laugh. He sees Taejun’s face drop and he knows he’s hurt his pride.

“You’re a washed up old creep. Why would I take any interest in you?”

For a second, Taejun does look hurt. But then another gross smirk paints itself on his face.

“Okay. You know, kid, I've seen this before.” He says. There’s a smug intonation to his voice that Junjie recognises instantly. A judgemental little voice that sounds a lot like his dad rings in his head, about the nouveau riche and how impressed with themselves they always are and how much they think everyone is going to obsess over them. Junjie fixes him with the type of look that quells arguments in Tarot every time without fail.

“What have you seen before, Taejun?” Junjie asks, in a way that makes him sound like a busy mother half-listening to an excitable toddler. He focuses his attention on the soundboard, though he mostly just performs work. There’s a creeping feeling in the bottom of his spine- maybe this is how it feels to truly cringe at someone. ‘Just take the rejection, dude,’ Junjie thinks.

“Hyung.” Taejun corrects. Junjie just looks at him.

“What have you seen before, hyung?” He asks. The word drips with spite, and Taejun gives a scoff in return.

“I've seen boys like you.” He says, rising from his spot on the studio couch. His hands rest on the back of Junjie’s chair, leaning in. He stops way too close to Junjie, his mouth right at his ear. So close Junjie can smell the lunch on his breath. “Stuck up little twinks with expensive educations who think they’re worth the chase. I bet you’re the same as them all. Underneath all that posturing, you’re fucking hungry for it. I bet you beg for fucking cock.”

Ice water runs through his veins, and Junjie feels his heartbeat in his ears. He reaches out, as innocuous as he can manage, to wrap his fingers around the neck of the steel flask keeping his water cool. He gathers his nerve, preparing to swing up at him if necessary. “Okay,” he says, speaking slowly and carefully. “If you don’t get away from me in the next three seconds, I’ll smash your fucking face in.”

Taejun doesn’t back up. Instead, one of his big hands lands on Junjie’s little shoulder, and he leans in further. “You won’t.” he says. His voice is low and gravelly, and Junjie barely has time to react to what’s happening before Taejun is spinning the chair around, leaning in. His lips are but centimeters away from Junjie’s by the time Junjie’s brain starts responding, and for some reason he drops his flask, instead his hands spread wide across Taejun’s face, pushing at him with all of his might.

it’s a pathetic display of strength; Taejun stumbles back but barely moves, however the office chair does push back on its hind wheels. the wire of the thick headphones around Junjie’s neck pulls taught, and as the jack is pulled from the computer, Junjie tries to save himself way too late. The chair tips to one side and topples over, Junjie falling with it. His right arm extends in a futile attempt to break his fall and finds itself landing painfully underneath an armrest. Junjie lets out a yelp of pain, but his brain is still in flight mode. His head snaps up to the tall man in front of him, and he scrambles to his feet, pushing himself into the corner of the desks, as far away as he can manage to get in the cramped little studio.

Taejun just stares at him, eyes wide and mouth agape. Junjie’s heart is beating so fast in his chest that it hurts, and he feels like a knife has been driven down his throat. His arm is pulsing and warm, and it hurts, and everything falls away; every scrap of power he’s ever thought himself to have, both in earnest and bravado. In moments like this, he’d always like to think he’d tell Taejun about himself, tear him down to his bare essentials and then dismantle them with scrutiny, a scathing speech worthy of admiration.

He manages four words.

“Please don’t hurt me.”

Taejun’s mouth flaps aimlessly for a few seconds. Junjie’s shoulders are hunched, drawing in on himself. He can feel his entire body begin to tremble.

“I-” Taejun’s demeanor breaks, and he moves forward to place a hand on Junjie’s shoulder, giving him a wounded look when Junjie screws his eyes shut and flinches. “That’s such an over- I would never…”

Junjie keeps his eyes closed, taking a deep breath through his nose. Taejun lets out a noise of disbelief, and after what feels like minutes, Junjie hears his heavy footsteps pounding into the studio floor, and then a sharp slam of the door that causes him to start in fright.

When the footsteps have disappeared down the hallway, Junjie lets out a noise somewhere between a sob and a dry-heave. His face falls into his hands, and he forces the lump in his throat down, breathing slowly through the gaps in his fingers and doing everything he can to try and slow the jackhammer rate of his heart.

What the fuck was that? With his uninjured arm, he reaches up to pull his bangs from his face, puffing out a sigh. He'd never had a reaction like that to anything before.

But somewhere along the line of his twenty-one years, after a lifetime of his father’s absence and his classmates’ bigotry, Junjie had promised himself to never shed another tear over antagonistic men and their egos. So he swipes away the tears in his eyes and clears his throat roughly. He reaches out, as if to stretch his arms, but winces suddenly at the shooting pain in his arm. it’s not sore enough to be broken, he doesn’t think, but he’ll have his manager take him to the emergency room later, just in case.

He's halfway through thinking of a lie to explain how he’d hurt himself when the realization of what he’s doing tears through his nerves like a lightning bolt. “Fuck that,” he mutters to himself.

Taejun did not deserve his protection.

Junjie straightens out his clothes, picks the office chair up off of the floor, and carries himself out of the recording studio. Down the hallway, into the elevator, to the highest floor of Valentine Records’ excessively tall HQ.

“Is Sajangnim here?” Junjie asks the pretty secretary outside the CEO's office. She gives him a look that he knows to mean she’s about to politely lie to his face and pretend that there’s some kind of important meeting currently going on, but before she can, the door opens.

Seobin steps out of his office, ‘oh’-ing in surprise at the sight of Junjie. Junjie folds himself into a stiff, polite bow, and as he rises, Seobin offers him his most professional smile. “Junjie. What a surprise. How can I help you?”

Junjie steals his nerve.

“I need to report something.”

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sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

010 : JAW OF THE BEAST.

Starring: Kang Minwoo.

Featuring: Jung Myeongjae.

Summary: Minwoo sells his soul.

Word Count: 2k.

CW: Sponsorship, trauma response.

In almost 24 years, Minwoo had done a lot of things that required a lot of bravery.

At nine years old, he stood in front of a huge audience at a national competition and danced solo. When he didn’t win, he plastered a huge smile on his face and clapped loudest for the winner. At thirteen, he’d obscured the view of the drama his parents were watching and declared himself gay with no room for doubt and such a sense of conviction that he hadn’t even considered the rejection that may, but fortunately didn’t, follow. At sixteen, he had sex with a boy for the first time, and hadn’t so much as imagined the possibility he might not be very good at it regardless of his lack of experience.

At eighteen, he made the decision to enter the industry even though his father had warned him it would be the hardest and most exhausting thing he’d ever do, and would only get easier if he stopped. At nineteen, he sat atop a car in a gross old parking lot as the sun set, and asked Tachikawa Tetsuo if he could kiss him. At twenty-three, he presented himself to the world in split-dyed hair and his dad’s old jacket and demanded they remember who he was.

Minwoo had done a lot of brave things. He was a brave person.

Right now, he’s not being brave. He's hyperventilating in a bathroom stall, in one of the classiest restaurants he’d ever stepped foot in. He'd never felt underdressed in a suit before, but that was only about six percent of the greater issue. The greater issue was that he thought he could make this easy for himself- thought that the several shots of vodka he’d downed would have given him enough courage to face anything. He thought that he could look this man in the eye and make a demand, feel anything other than an almost crippling fear, as if he hadn’t spent the past four months of his life haunted by him, seeing him even in the man he loves.

It's not easy. In fact, it feels impossible. But Minwoo is here because it’s what he needs to do for his family. And so it’s with that in mind that he takes a deep breath and unlocks the bathroom stall. He takes a look in the mirror, adjusts his bangs, and steps back out into the restaurant, where the monster under his bed awaits.

“I was beginning to think you’d run away from me.” Says Jung Myeongjae.

For a moment, as he looks at him, the entire restaurant freezes. It’s as if the lights have cut out, spotlight on Myeongjae, Minwoo firmly in the dark where nobody can see and anything can get him. He feels his heart begin to palpitate, his palms sweat, and he hates himself for how afraid he is. He shouldn’t be. Myeongjae is an old man. He'd cut and paste at his face enough to de-age him a little, but Minwoo knows him to be somewhere in his sixties. At the end of the day, he’s just a sad old man who nobody loves, who’d lived a life in the closet and lost all chance at a genuine shot at this, at real, meaningful love or intimacy, and so now he lords his power over money-hungry record labels and gets them to send boys in their early twenties like tribute to a fearsome ancient god. Minwoo shouldn’t be scared of someone like that.

Except for the fact that Inkigayo is in Myeongjae’s network’s back pocket. One false step and Minwoo could literally lose his job. He approaches the table slow, pulls his chair out softly and sits on it with a hesitance. He thinks Myeongjae must know that he’s afraid. He regards him with a blank expression, though, betraying no emotion to Minwoo. Minwoo doesn’t know if he’s happy to be here with him or if it’s a nuisance. Seungsoo had asked a thousand questions when Minwoo asked him to find Jung Myeongjae’s phone number. It makes sense that Seobin had hid it from him; arranged for a different manager to take Minwoo to the hotel that night. Seungsoo would have probably beaten Seobin to death if he knew.

“Sorry.” Minwoo says, picking his fork up primly and rolling it around the pasta dish he’d ordered. He has no idea what he’s eating, but he doesn’t actually have much of an appetite anyway. He would have had this meeting anywhere; the restaurant was Myeongjae’s idea. Truthfully, Minwoo isn’t comfortable with him buying him a meal. He doesn’t want to owe him any more than he has to.

“That's okay.” Myeongjae says, simply, cutting into his steak. Red juices flow from the meat, and though Minwoo knows enough about food, having grown up in a restaurant, to know that it’s not really blood, it still churns his stomach. He takes a bite, and he chews wetly in a way that makes Minwoo itch. After he swallows, he says, factually, “Seobin doesn’t know you’re here.”

“No.” Minwoo confirms. “I asked my manager to find your number for me.”

“I see.” Myeongjae says. “I was very surprised to hear from you. I thought you might be trying to blackmail me.”

Minwoo looks up at him, meets his eyes and finds that Myeongjae is searching him, as if he’s looking for guilt in him. There's a lot of that, but Minwoo’s superpower is to glass his eyes over and lock everybody out. He hadn’t even considered the possibility of blackmail. He was too smart. Men like Jung Myeongjae couldn’t be defeated. There was no attack. To get what you wanted, you had to barter.

“You like me, right?” Minwoo asks. He says it seriously, but Myeongjae fixes him with an amused look that makes him feel juvenile.

Myeongjae raises his wine glass to his lips, smirking over its rim. After a sip of it, he says; “I think you’re gorgeous. And I haven't forgotten how good you feel, either.”

The words feel like a punch in the gut. Minwoo takes a gulp of his own wine, nodding, trying his best to breeze past it. He tries to ignore how Myeongjae had felt; sharp and selfish and wrong. “Right,” he says, taking particular interest in the pattern on the table cloth. “Right, well, I was wondering-”

“You’re offering yourself to me.” Myeongjae says. The phrasing makes Minwoo want to deny, vehemently so, but he supposes that that’s exactly what he’s doing. He inhales sharply through his teeth, head dropping, gaze falling to his lap. “How much do you want?”

It's as if the oxygen has become solid and it’s crushing Minwoo down, pushing him into the ground and suffocating. He'd never felt like this before. He wonders if this is how Harin feels when he has one of his moments and, if it is, then how he even bears to face the world. Minwoo has no room for pride, though, not anymore. Though it chips away at his ego, and he feels the first ever threat to his masculinity in his life, he says; “I need five hundred thousand won.”

There’s a pause. Minwoo doesn’t know why, but he can’t bring himself to look at Myeongjae. the silence ticks over, and he passes it by picking at his nails and trying to mentally will his hands to stop shaking.

“Minwoo.” Myeongjae says. Minwoo hates that. His name sounds wrong in Myeongjae’s voice. “You realise that that isn’t even a dent in what I paid your label, don’t you?”

The words prickle. He sucks in another breath, drawing his shoulders in on himself. He can’t think about that. He can’t think about Seobin collecting money from Minwoo’s body, while Minwoo’s family struggle to make ends meet. While he prepares to put himself through this all again just so he can help them.

“That's all I need.” Minwoo says. The money isn’t even for him. It's so he can pay for Minhyung's Japan trip. For his entire life, Minwoo had had all the help he needed to get the career he wanted. It wasn’t fair that Minhyung wasn’t going to get the same. A tour of some Japanese animation studios and contemporary art galleries wasn’t much, but at least it was something. At least he’d be contributing.

“I have no issue paying you more.”

“No.” Minwoo says, quickly. He doesn’t want to take more than he needs. He doesn’t want to gain anything from this. Nothing he spent the money on would bring him any joy. He would just always know. He'd know how he got it and it would destroy everything.

“I'm not really in a position where I can just take you home.” Myeongjae says. Minwoo forces himself not to wonder what that means. He doesn’t want to know. “I'm taking a trip to Jeju next month. Just me. How about this; I give you the money right now, and you accompany me?”

“A trip?” Minwoo asks. He looks up at Myeongjae, finally, and the fear must waver in his voice because Myeongjae fixes him with a complicated expression.

“It's two days. After that, I won't hold it over you. I won't contact you, I won't ask for anything more from you.”

Minwoo scratches his cheek. He can’t imagine being alone with Myeongjae for two days. Certainly not so far from Seoul. A thousand things could go wrong. Myeongjae could murder him and throw him into the ocean, just to knock the tip off of the iceberg. Minwoo doesn’t even know if he’s trying to be hyperbolic or not when he thinks that. He has no idea what Myeongjae is capable of. But coercing record labels into pimping out their artists didn’t exactly promise a strong moral code.

The idea is terrifying. Terrifying and he’d be so stupid to go along with it. It’s not as if being around Myeongjae has eased any of his anxieties. His heart still feels like it’s beating out of time, his palms are still sweating, his mouth is dry and even the thought of taking a bite of his fancy pasta dish churns his stomach. Every single instinct in his body is screaming danger, it’s telling him to run as fast as he can and never look back. He knows he shouldn’t say yes to this. He knows he can’t. But if he doesn’t, then he’s back to square one, and it’s likely that Minhyung will go without in turn. He can’t put himself before his brother again. That had been Minhyung's entire life. And that isn’t fair.

Minwoo gives his answer.

Minwoo stands in the alleyway outside the restaurant. Myeongjae is long gone, whisked away by a driver as soon as they’d finished their meal. Minwoo had refused a ride, making up a lie about Seungsoo insisting he be the one to drive him home. In reality, Seungsoo had sounded annoyed when Minwoo called him. He does feel a little bad; Sour Candy had definitely made a bad habit out of using him as their personal taxi service. But Minwoo didn’t want to endure another second with Myeongjae. On his way out, he’d placed his hand on Minwoo’s shoulder in a parting sort of way, and his skin still feels like it’s burning. He just wants to shower.

Truthfully, he has no idea how he’s supposed to stomach two days with Myeongjae. He’d already been transferred the money, and there’s a voice in his head telling him to just block his number and cut off contact, but Sour Candy promote their music on his station. It's then when he understands, with a horrible sinking feeling, that there will never be any true escape from this. Even if Myeongjae is true to his world and lets Minwoo move on as soon as the trip is over, he’s always going to know. Once a week, every promotional cycle, he’s going to stand in the monster’s den and use its stage to beg for love and validation from a crowd who would want him dead if they knew what he did.

As he waits for Seungsoo’s car, hidden away from the street, he fishes his phone out of his pocket and sends a text to Minhyung.

‘I got the money for your trip.’

He’ll be brave. For his family, he’ll be brave.

He has to be.

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sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

009 : HUNDREDS OF LITTLE PRAYERS.

Starring: Tachikawa Tetsuo.

Featuring: Song Taejun, Jade Lim.

Summary: Tetsuo makes a mistake.

Word Count: 3k.

CW: Sexual reference, light dom/sub dynamic, choking, not full-out smut but still very NSFW.

Tetsuo listens to the click of Taejun’s indicator light and tries to pretend what he’s doing is normal. It wouldn’t be out of character, really, if only it were anybody else in the driver’s seat.

“I was surprised to get your call.” Taejun says. Tetsuo just hums. He's not surprised that he called Taejun, but he’s disappointed in himself. Long gone were the days where Tetsuo would kneel under Taejun’s studio desk while he worked. It’s not that Tetsuo suddenly found himself thinking he was above things like that, or anything. It's just that Taejun was kind of an odd case.

It had all started out so suddenly. Summer of 2020, after a couple of intense years of promoting in Tarot which felt more like a couple of months, Yoo Seobin formally introduced Tetsuo to song Taejun, and told them they’d be working together on Tetsuo’s solo record. Somewhere around the fourth recording session, Tetsuo found himself with his chest pressed tight against the recording booth window, Taejun crouched behind him with his big hands spreading Tetsuo’s ass cheeks apart and his tongue deep between them.

It’s all a blur. Tetsuo knows he didn’t start it, but when he realized where it was going, he was all too eager to keep it on that track. Eventually they spent almost as much time debasing the studio as they did recording in it. It was just for fun; and Tetsuo hadn’t ever really attached much value to sex beyond fun. For as long as he’d been sexually active, he’d always gotten around. He was well aware that he’d already built himself a bit of a reputation in the industry, and he was fine with that. Thanks to that reputation, he could have easily been in any man’s car, right now. But he’s in Taejun’s.

Tetsuo last heard from Taejun a month after his album dropped, when he and Minwoo agreed to be boyfriends and, though they’d decided that they could sleep with other people as long as they were safe and honest about it, Tetsuo didn’t really think a long-running friends with benefits situation was really appropriate anymore. As far as he knew, Taejun didn’t want anything more than sex from their arrangement, so he’d imagined the discussion would be pretty easy. Yet when Tetsuo paid a visit to Taejun, feeling he at least owed him a face-to-face conversation, Taejun had just gone quiet and nodded. And when Tetsuo started to ask if he was okay, he’d interrupted and said ‘if we’re not gonna fuck then there’s no need for you to still be here, is there?’

That was the last time Taejun had spoken to Tetsuo.

Later, Minwoo would confide that Taejun had always given him horrendous vibes and call him a creep. ‘He's always eyeing me. it’s like he’s undressing me in his imagination. and he’s never, like, put a hand on me, but he always gets way too close. I refuse to be alone with that guy.’

And Tetsuo had kept secret from Minwoo that he had so earnestly returned Taejun’s same advances. That he had let Taejun undress him and put his hands on him and wanted it. He didn’t want Minwoo to judge him or think him desperate.

Minwoo left, though. He’d ignored him for a month and Tetsuo wants to be fucked. He wants to be fucked by someone who, at the very least, knows what his last name is. And it couldn’t really be anybody Minwoo would approve of. None of Minwoo’s friends would touch him, and Tetsuo didn’t actually have any friends outside of Valentine; it had purposefully been manipulated to be an insular community. Open as their relationship may have been, there was a matter of respect now that it was over. Weighing up who was considered his friend and who was considered Minwoo’s only left Tetsuo with his groupmates, and that wasn’t going to happen.

He wouldn’t even know where to start seducing one of the Histeria members. Taejun, for better or worse, was the only option left.

“So,” Taejun says. Tetsuo just wants the car ride to be over so they don’t have to speak anymore. He knows that he’s well within his right to sleep with whoever he wants, but something about the whole thing just makes him feel cheap. He's never felt that way before - or, maybe he has, but he’d liked it. This was a different type of feeling altogether. Maybe it’s shame. That's a new one. “What happened to your boyfriend?”

“Dumped me,” Tetsuo says shortly, looking out of the window.

“Why?”

“Didn’t say.”

“So I’m a rebound fuck?”

“Yes.”

Taejun snorts out a laugh, shaking his head. “I'm not complaining. I've missed you.”

“You haven’t once tried to speak to me.” Tetsuo says, scratching his eyebrow with his pinkie.

“Well, yeah,” Taejun scoffs. He keeps his eyes on the road, but Tetsuo can see his smirk in the reflection of the window against the pitch black night. “I didn't miss speaking to you.”

Tetsuo folds his arms. “Nice,” he says.

“C’mon.” Taejun says. “I'm kidding. And it’s not like we ever did much talking in the first place. We worked and fucked and that’s how we both liked it.”

“I guess,” Tetsuo says, looking down at his lap.

“Hey,” Taejun’s voice drops an octave, in its best effort at comforting. “I was trying to be funny. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings.”

“It's fine, you didn’t.” Tetsuo says. Taejun may have been speaking in the cadence of a joke, but Tetsuo knew there was a truth behind it. He hadn’t expected Taejun to have missed him. If he missed him, he wouldn’t have spent the past year barely acknowledging that he existed, awkwardly treating Tetsuo like a distant acquaintance in front of others as if he hadn’t once made a habit out of being down his throat. He didn’t expect any different from this, but he had imagined Taejun might do a better job at pretending.

By the time they pull up at Taejun’s house, Tetsuo is half considering just asking him to drive him home. But he knows he’ll regret it if he doesn’t do it. And he doesn’t doubt that Minwoo is fucking other people, too. So he gets out of the car, and lets Taejun spread his hand across his lower back as he ushers him into the house. As soon as the door closes behind them, Taejun’s big hands wrap around Tetsuo’s waist and push him hard against the wood.

Taejun looms over him, and presses their bodies together. with such little space in between them, Tetsuo has to crane his neck up to look at him. There’s just under twenty centimetres’ difference in height between them, and Tetsuo had forgotten that part of it. The weird thrill of how much bigger and stronger Taejun is. Minwoo was stronger than he looked, being a dancer, but he was short and lithe like Tetsuo. It didn't make the sex any worse, but there’s something about Taejun towering over him, one hand slowly travelling up his side, parting from his body as it reaches his chest, only to cup the bottom of his chin and tilt his head up. Taejun holds Tetsuo as if he’s a delicate ornament, too easy to break, and under the large span of his palms, that’s exactly what Tetsuo feels like.

“You look good,” Taejun says. “With your hair buzzed like that. It suits you.”

Tetsuo gives a soft smile; though the words really only serve to drive home just how long Taejun had been pretending he didn’t exist. Tetsuo had first started shaving his head in August last year. “Thanks,” He says, simply.

“It's a shame that I can't pull it anymore though.”

Tetsuo does snort out a laugh at that, though perhaps only because Minwoo had expressed the exact same sentiment.

“You’ll just have to be creative.” He smiles up at him, pushing himself up onto his tiptoes to press their lips together. Taejun’s hand wraps around the back of Tetsuo’s head, his other hand spreading across the small of his back and pulling his body closer.

As they kiss, and Tetsuo’s eyes flutter closed, his hands running up the muscled planes of Taejun’s abdomen and resting on his chest, Tetsuo thinks that maybe he made the right choice. Minwoo was made of angles and sharp edges. Taejun is all hard rounded muscle and rough touches, his fingertips dig into Tetsuo’s scalp just a little too hard and it spins his brain around. The kiss breaks and Tetsuo looks up into Taejun’s eyes, round and expressive and he’s relieved not to see the glass baby doll eyes of Minwoo, who can see so far into Tetsuo but Tetsuo can’t see anything back. Minwoo’s eyes are so good at hiding everything, sparkling yet easy to sharpen to a point. Taejun looks at Tetsuo with a palpable lust, so easy to read, as if Tetsuo is food and Taejun is a starved man. Perhaps this was always the only option; the only true avenue for distraction.

“How do you want it?” Taejun asks.

“Hard,” Tetsuo says. “Make it so I can’t think anymore.”

Taejun grins, hand sliding down to the back of Tetsuo’s neck before dropping, only to cup the underneath of his jaw, fingers tightening just slightly around the top of Tetsuo’s throat. He pushes back, Tetsuo’s head knocking against the door with a soft thud. His heart begins to race, a hand curling around Taejun’s wrist, though it’s mostly performative, making no effort to pull it away. He can already feel himself growing hard, thighs shuffling slightly as he looks up at Taejun, refusing to be the one to break eye contact.

“Are you gonna be a good boy for me?” Taejun asks.

“Yes, sir.” Tetsuo breathes. It almost feels like no time has passed since the last time they did this, easily falling back into their old dynamic. Tetsuo is glad. He needs this, needs to turn his brain off and blindly follow Taejun’s orders again.

“Get down, then.” Taejun says, pulling his hands from him.

Tetsuo rests his back against the door and lets his body slide down it, tucking his hands under his ass as he falls to his knees, opening his mouth wide, obedient, eyes locking with Taejun’s. he looks down at him darkly, undoing his belt and dropping it down beside Tetsuo. Tetsuo flinches a little as the metal buckle clatters against the hard wooden floor, and just for a second, he sees something dark flash in Taejun’s eyes.

He will be nothing, for a while. nothing but food to be eaten. And that’s better than being sad.

Taejun finishes with a deep groan in Tetsuo’s ear.

His hips quake against the curve of Tetsuo’s ass, stomach twitching against his back. Tetsuo winces as he feels him pull out, and he raises his head from the pillow it had been pushed into, folding his arms underneath it and letting out a groan.

“Fuck.” Taejun says as he rolls onto his back, flopping beside Tetsuo. His muscular chest is red and heaving, a hand pushing his bangs from his face as he turns to regard Tetsuo. “I forgot how good you can take it.”

Tetsuo feels his face heat up at the words, burying his face back in the pillow as he lets out a bashful laugh. His heart still hammers in his chest, his lower back is already starting to ache, and his feet are cramped from curling his toes. And if he had wondered why he’d ever bothered to entertain Taejun’s advances in the first place, he supposes that the way his legs tremble is his answer. He’d had three orgasms. He'd wanted to turn his brain off, and Taejun had definitely gotten him to do that.

“You should shower,” Taejun says. “Then I'll drive you home.”

And it’s really not like Tetsuo had expected to stay the night. Maybe he thought they might cuddle a little, though. And he feels stupid to be disappointed when he’d known exactly what he came here for and had gotten it.

“You go first,” he says, voice muffled, not lifting his head from the pillow. Laying in his mess on the sheets is becoming more and more unpleasant as it cools, but he still can’t exactly feel his legs. “I don't think I'm ready to stand up.”

Taejun laughs at that, reaching out to give Tetsuo’s bare ass a little smack as he pushes himself up. he settles beside him, hands landing once more on Tetsuo’s ass cheeks. He pulls them apart, and Tetsuo can feel Taejun’s cum leak out of him. For some reason, it’s repulsive to him to have Taejun look at that. He wants to pull his hands away, but he really has no reason to, so he just screws his eyes shut and pretends it’s Minwoo. Which is antithetical to the purpose of being here, but it makes him feel a little less disgusting.

“Can I take a picture?” Taejun asks. The thought of it actually makes Tetsuo’s skin crawl.

“I'd rather you didn’t.” He says.

“I won't get your face in it, or anything.”

“I'm just, like, really not comfortable with that,” He says. Taejun lets go of him, humming briskly under his breath and getting off the bed to make his way to the en suite bathroom. Tetsuo guesses that that means any conversation they might have had is over.

In a way that should have been obvious the very first time they met, Tetsuo realizes that Taejun is kind of a manchild. Even his big fancy house was decorated the way a 12 year old boy would dream of decorating the mansion they’d fantasize about buying one day. It was full of baseball memorabilia; from framed posters of players on the walls, to signed bats and balls in display cases. Tetsuo guesses that that’s fine - he has a collection of signed albums from his seniors that he holds with utmost reverence, and a photocard of his favorite male idol in the back of his phone case.

But even he’d recently taken his posters down, kind of feeling like at twenty-two years of age, he’d perhaps outgrown the need to scrapbook his interests across his bedroom walls. Taejun was twenty-nine and he’d used his fame and fortune to buy a mansion only to turn it into a shrine to baseball. It was a little odd.

Tetsuo rolls onto his stomach, grimacing as his skin peels away from the damp sheets. His abdomen is slick and cold and sticky, and the feeling from earlier is very much back - he feels cheap. His fingers curl around the little golden cross that never leaves his neck, and he looks to the ceiling and glares past it.

“Shut up.” He mutters.

Taejun drops Tetsuo off around the corner. “It’s easier for both of us if nobody sees.” He says. “I’m not supposed to fuck you guys.”

Tetsuo doesn’t question the phrasing. He doesn't wonder why Taejun’s car doesn’t pull away. He's not paying enough attention anymore to pick up on it. as he steps out into the chilly night, he just pulls the hood of the oversized hoodie he’d borrowed from Taejun (his own had been casualty to the first of the three orgasms, so Taejun told him he’d wash it and give it to him ‘next time.’ Tetsuo doesn’t intend to get it back.) over his head and tries his best to not look like he’s limping his way back to the building.

He doesn't want to be seen by anybody. He doesn’t want them to know that he did this. But even now, past two in the morning, luck is not on his side. Jade catches him at the door of the apartment complex Valentine’s younger groups reside in, holding it wide open for him and clearly not reading anything from Tetsuo’s body language; which he imagines must scream ‘I don’t want to be acknowledged.’

“Hey, Tetsuo!” Jade greets in English with a cheerful bow. Taking the door handle from him, Tetsuo offers a polite bow and a pleasant smile.

As he steps backwards into the hallway light, he asks “Where are you off to?” but Jade isn’t listening. His smile has dropped, and he’s looking at the hoodie swamping Tetsuo’s thin frame with a heavy brow.

“Where did you get that?” he asks, suspicion heavy in his voice. Suddenly, Tetsuo feels himself panic. The guilt of what he’s done must be written all over his face. Wait, fuck, is there anything else on his face? Are his eyes still puffy from tears? Is he limping? Does he smell like sex? He feels his heart battering in his chest, and he doesn’t know why, because he’s a grown man and everyone knows that he’s a slut anyway, and Jade has no room to judge, and he hasn’t done anything fucking wrong.

Right?

“Uh.” he looks down; and the check mark on the breast of the hoodie screams a quick answer at him. “The Nike store.”

Jade regards him for a second. “Oh.” He says. His face softens, and he gives another smile. “Well, it looks good on you! Anyway, my ride’s waiting, so.”

With another little bow, Jade disappears into the night, and Tetsuo quickly shuts himself in the apartment complex hallway and lets out a shaky sigh that comes out halfway to a cough. Running his hand over his head, he mutters; “jesus fucking christ.”

Wearily, he regards the stairwell with his lips thinned into a bemused line as he laments his still wobbling knees. Tarot lived on the fifth floor.

Who knew getting railed could have so many downsides.

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sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

008 : PIETY.

Starring: Kang Minwoo.

Featuring: A boy, Kim Seungsoo, Minwoo's Mom, Kang Minhyung.

Summary: Minwoo visits home.

Word Count: 4k.

CW: Sexual reference, trauma response, unhealthy coping mechanisms, sponsorship, conflict between parents.

Minwoo wakes up in an unfamiliar bedroom, light filtering in the window and birds chirping cheerily in a way that makes his hangover, somehow, seem a thousand times worse. He groans as he pushes himself up, the sheet falling from his bare chest, faded pink hair sore at the scalp from a night of sleeping with product and hairspray in. It’s all bent out of shape, aching from being pushed in the wrong direction. He grimaces, tucking his elbows over his knees, casting a glance downwards to the man sleeping on the other side of the bed.

He’s pretty, but Minwoo doesn’t know him. He looks like he’s probably an idol or an actor; he has that sort of industry standard look about him. Minwoo’s sure that there’s probably a litany of girls who would murder to be in his spot, right now.

That was the kind of rush Minwoo had once enjoyed. Fucking these little it boys who had fanbases the size of small nations; asking them ‘what would all your little fan girls think if they could see you now’ as he hits that spot in them that makes them break. It had all been so fun, once. And it was still always fun at the start, but now, he has to get blackout drunk to get through it without seeing him and freaking out. He lifts the sheet and finds, sure enough, that they’re both naked. Minwoo sucks a breath between his teeth. He doesn’t remember last night at all.

He knows he’s being an asshole as he slowly creeps out of the bed, trying to decipher which clothes are his and which belong to the other. For the most part, it’s easy; Minwoo is way more stylish than the other guy. The only thing he’s not really sure about is the underwear, so he just picks a pair and prays to god that the universe is on his side.

He goes to the guy’s bathroom. Quickly, he uses his shower, rinsing the product out of his hair and washing all the most important bits with the supermarket-bought shower gel that Minwoo suspects is not the peak of skincare. He steps out and steals a towel from his cabinet, drying himself off and dressing and doing everything he can to ignore the fact that the entire room is spinning and his insides are threatening to empty themselves with every too harsh movement he makes.

He changes back into last night’s clothes and steps out of the bathroom with the towel over his wet hair, drying it off roughly as he steps into the man’s room again, just to make sure he hadn’t woken him.

There’s a sinking disappointment in him, though, when he sees the guy sitting up in bed, a pair of glasses upon his face as he scrolls through his phone. He looks up as Minwoo opens the door. “I thought you’d run away.” he says, offering him a small smile.

Minwoo forces one back, realising that he could have easily just left. The opportunity to avoid awkwardness is well and truly dead now. He shakes his head, walking to the bed and kneeling upon it, giving the boy a soft kiss, trying his best to keep it from showing as the soft movement of the mattress underneath him makes his stomach lurch.

“Just showering.” He says. “But I do need to head. I have practice in a couple of hours, and I can’t really go wearing this.” He says, gesturing loosely to his party clothes.

“I have to practise clothes,” says the boy. He wraps his hand around the back of Minwoo’s neck, pulling him in for another kiss. This time it’s a little deeper, and a little more suggestive. When they pull away, he gives him an arch look. “If you want to have more fun for a while.”

There's something about the lust in his eyes that takes Minwoo somewhere; and he sees tight skin, and the lingering taste of alcohol on both of their lips suddenly reminds him of the way he tasted like whiskey, and suddenly it’s almost too much for Minwoo to stomach. He feels another lurch, and he backs up, a hand spreading across his mouth as he takes a deep breath, trying his best to keep everything down.

“Wow.” The boy says with a laugh. “No thanks would have been enough.”

Minwoo cringes, pulling his hand away from his mouth and shooting an apologetic look. “I'm sorry,” he says. “That was just bad timing. I’m a lot more hungover than I'm letting on.”

The boy just laughs, shaking his head with a smile as he settles back down on his bed, head hitting the pillow as he wraps his blankets closer around him. “Don’t worry about it.” He says. “You should probably skip practice, though.”

Seungsoo would probably let him. Whoever this stranger is, he seems like a nice enough guy. Minwoo feels bad, and part of him entertains the idea of staying, but he knows he can’t have sex sober, and he highly doubts he’s going to be content to just sit and talk.

“Yeah, probably,” he says, pulling the towel from his still damp hair. He holds onto it awkwardly for a second, before saying; “Where should I…”

“Just dump it with my clothes.” The boy says. “I'll clean up later.”

Minwoo nods, tossing it in amongst the leftover clothes. He stands, clearing his throat a little, trying not to gag from the lingering taste of alcohol and cigarettes.

“Well,” he says. “Goodbye.”

“Can I have your number?” The boy asks. Minwoo visibly hesitates, and the boy’s face hardens a little, another laugh escaping him, this time a little too dry to really believe. “Never mind. I’ll see you around.”

Minwoo bows his head, and tries not to look too eager to leave on his way out.

Minwoo fishes his phone from his pocket as he walks down the street. He’s pretty sure that he’s in itaewon. He’ll call Seungsoo when he finds a street sign, but for now, he’s just aimlessly wandering. The clock tells him that it’s only 7am. He’d never been able to sleep late if he’d been drinking, no matter when he went to bed. He walks slow, and still each footstep sends a jolt of discomfort to his head.

Realising that there are people who care and worry about him, he checks his messages, albeit begrudgingly. It’s the same as usual, Harin asks him if he’ll be home that night, there’s a general stream-of-conscious timeline of Jade’s thoughts throughout the night, (‘i’m going to make cookies,’ ‘why isn’t sailor moon on netflix wtf,’ ‘why are men like this!!!!’) Chaerin pesters him for some nail polish he borrowed four months ago that she refuses to forget about; but when he scrolls down far enough, he reaches a message he doesn’t expect.

‘They’re fighting again.’ Sent at 11pm the prior night.

There’s a sudden lurch in Minwoo’s heart as it hits him that he’d been too busy blacking out to be there for someone who truly needed him.

He swallows thickly, despite the fact his mouth is sandpaper dry, and dials Seungsoo’s number.

“Where?” Is all Seungsoo says when he picks up the phone. Minwoo sighs through his nose.

“I’m not sure.” He says, leaning against someone’s garden wall, wrapping his arm around his waist. In hindsight, he definitely should have borrowed clothes from whoever it was he had gone home with. His party clothes are not befitting of the daylight; and an old woman glares at him as she passes, so he’s pretty sure he may as well be wearing a big neon sign that reads ‘Walk of shame.’ She mutters something about disgrace; and Minwoo is, like, ninety nine percent sure that she would have no idea who Sour Candy are, so he tucks his phone under his ear and calls after her, “I just got done banging a dude!”

“Who the fuck are you yelling at?” Seungsoo’s voice comes yelling, muffled from his phone. Minwoo raises the speaker back to his ear.

“Just some old lady.” he says. “Can I miss practice today?”

There’s a pause. “No.”

“Please, hyung.” Minwoo pushes, undeterred. Seungsoo never gave in straight away, but he almost always caved quick. “It's a family thing. And I'm ahead with the dance anyway. You know I am, I always am.”

Seungsoo sighs. “What kind of family thing?”

“My parents have been arguing lately.” Minwoo says. There’s no reason to lie to Seungsoo. Of all the staff at Valentine, Seungsoo was the most trustworthy. That, and he had kids of his own; real young kids who he never saw. His wife had divorced him years ago and taken their family to busan, leaving Seungsoo alone in Seoul with nothing else to his name. Minwoo didn’t know the whole story, and likely never would. But he did know that Seungsoo wouldn’t be able to bear the thought of his little brother sitting at the top of the stairs, listening to his parents fight any better than Minwoo could. “Minhyung texted. I want to visit home and make sure he’s okay. He gets really cut up about it.”

Seungsoo sighs, and after a brief second of consideration, Minwoo hears a shuffle and knows he’s getting out of bed. “Ping me your location,” he says. Minwoo smiles. “And stay away from busy streets.”

“Thanks, hyung.”

“Yeah.” Seungsoo says.

Better showered and in more presentable attire; Minwoo stands outside of histoire d’amour and stares up at the cursive sign with a weird sort of feeling in the pit of his stomach. Seungsoo’s car pulls away behind him, and it’s disappeared down the street by the time Minwoo works up the courage to push the swinging door open and step inside.

The restaurant is always the same as he leaves it, which is as much a blessing as it is a curse. It makes for a comfortable homecoming in some ways, but he can already feel his brain begin to revert, as if he’s back to being some seventeen year old kid who lived from one dance solo to the next. The life of a show dog.

In a way, there’s not much difference between that and his life now, but Minwoo had learned that he much preferred not to compete. Sure, some of Sour Candy’s fans liked to pit them against Tarot and Medusa, but all that really mattered now that he had debuted was that each record sold more than the last. Minwoo stood alongside Chaerin on television every weekend, so Medusa's success just gave him the opportunity to have more eyes on him. And the unimaginable amount of money Tarot seemed to bring the company just by having Junjie step foot in china once every few months was only funnelled back into the funds that paid for all three groups’ extravagant videos and outfits. Maybe it’s just being an adult, but Minwoo had learned that the success of his peers was not a threat but a benefit, and his only competition was his highest previous achievements.

He's sure there’s something pavlovian there too, at least in the case of Tarot. Every time they hit a milestone in their career, Tetsuo would get all cute and excited and then be overcome with the urge to manually destroy his own vocal cords for a few days, and Minwoo was usually the weapon of choice. But now thinking about Tetsuo kills a little piece of Minwoo’s soul every time, so Minwoo shoves his nail between his teeth and makes his way to the back of the restaurant, through the staff only door.

“Mommy!” He yells up the stairs, frowning as no reply comes.

The flat above the restaurant is small, and Minwoo spots his mother sitting outside on the balcony as soon as he enters. He knocks on the glass door, and she jumps a bit, startled, but her face splits into a beautiful, beaming smile as she sees him, a cigarette dangling elegantly from a graceful hand. These days, were you to put Minwoo’s parents together and ask which one was once a star, you’d be justified to think it was his mother. His dad had aged normally and healthily, his face had set with wrinkles and he’d gotten a bit of a gut. He was still a handsome man, but an ordinary one. His mother, on the other hand, was radiant as ever. Even now, sitting at a glass table on the balcony having a cigarette for breakfast, with her hair uncombed and in a pair of faded eeyore pyjamas with a quippy konglish slogan printed on the shirt, she looked like a Hollywood actress. Minwoo would be lying if he said he didn’t wish he was her. The more grown up he had gotten, the more he’d found himself shadowing her; copying her mannerisms, the way she held herself.

“Minnie!” she calls as he slides open the door.

He steps out, leaning down to press a kiss to her temple. She reaches out, pinching his cheek between two sharp nails. He smiles as he sits down across from her, sliding her box of cigarettes over. She gives him a disapproving glance, but tosses her lighter in his direction.

“What a lovely surprise.”

“I had a day off.” he lies, placing the cigarette between his lips and lighting it without cracking the menthol. “So I thought I'd come visit. It’s been a little while.”

“Well I'm thrilled to see you.” She says with a grin. “How have things been going?”

He hesitates for a second. Really, the days had been blurring into one another. Sour Candy had been succeeding, but Minwoo thinks he’s probably been deteriorating. He felt empty, he couldn’t close his eyes without seeing Myeongjae, who’s aged face had been warped into a halloween mask by his imagination. For a second, he thinks of the relief that might bloom in his chest if he finally let it out, and he considers telling his mom. But he can’t do that. He can’t let her live with that. So he takes a deep draw, and forces on a tired smile and should probably have the whole EGOT by now for how good he’s getting at this.

“Yeah.” He says, nodding on his exhale. “Yeah, things are going really well. We filmed this show last week where we went out in the woods and did all these games and stuff.”

“Cabin in the Woods?” His mom asks. Minwoo nods with a noise of confirmation, and his mom beams again. “Oh, your grandma will be thrilled. She loves that show. I had her on the phone the other day, you know. She and your grandpa watch Inkigayo every sunday. They send me pictures of you on the tv every time. They were so proud of the album you sent them, too. They have it on their mantelpiece like it’s a trophy.”

Minwoo smiles a real smile, a warmth spreading across his chest. “That's sweet.” He says. “I think I'll stop by this afternoon.”

His mom gives an eager nod. “Oh, they’d love that, Minwoo. They’d love that.” And they just sit, smoking their cigarettes, until his mom stubs hers out and stands, taking a performative look at her watch in the way moms do and sighing. “I'd better go wake your brother up.” she says, tucking her hair behind her ear. “He has his part time job this afternoon. Did he tell you?”

Minwoo shakes his head no; and everything kind of stacks up and reminds him that he hadn’t really been keeping up with his family lately. It made him feel bad, but every one of them at Valentine was the same. It was a sacrifice they’d all had to make.

“He's working down at the bathhouse. At the reception.” She says. Minwoo snorts, and she fixes him a glare as he snickers.

“Do not tease him about it.” She warns, pointing a finger at him.

“I won't.” He says, raising his hands. “I just didn’t know high schoolers were allowed to work there.”

“It's not that type of bathhouse.” She says, giving him an exasperated look that only makes him snicker more. “You watch too much porn.”

Minwoo makes a disgusted noise of protest and she laughs, triumphant, as she steps back into the apartment.

“So like…” Minwoo says, slouching back in Minhyung's gaming chair. It's old and the leather is fraying at its edges, but still surprisingly comfortable. The room is decorated nicely, in an organised sort of manner that Minwoo didn’t have the energy for even now, but certainly didn’t as a teenager. The walls had been painted a clean white, decorated with print outs of Minhyung's digital art- intricate and detailed anime drawings. The carpet had been dug up and replaced with a sleek, lightwood patterned laminate, with a fluffy white rug in its centre. Upon it sits Minhyung, looking in the mirror propped up between the floor and wall, applying styling gel to his hair, already dressed in his work uniform. He’s seventeen and he looks it; and it’s always kind of jarring for Minwoo to see him, because he’s so used to being apart from him and his memory paints him as the tiny little kid who used to follow him everywhere.

This room is the only one in the house that’s changed. It’s come a far way from pirate themed wallpaper and bunk beds. They both have.

“What?” Minhyung asks when Minwoo doesn’t finish his sentence.

“What were they fighting about?” Minhyung deflates. He turns around to look at Minwoo, tucking his knees up into his chest. “Same as always.”

“Money?”

“Yeah.” Minwoo had figured as much, but it doesn’t feel good to be right. Money had been an issue for a while. A couple of hit songs really aren’t enough to live off of twenty five years later; and businesses ebbed and flowed. For a long time, the restaurant had brought in enough revenue for their family to live a comfortable life. In the last couple of years, however, the area had been featured on a dazed video for its local clothing district and became a lot more cool- and that saw an initial boom in custom until it saw a lot more restaurants opening up. The first chain place to open was a slash in the heel. By the time the fifth sprung up, the bills were barely being covered by the regulars alone.

There’s something that felt so fundamentally fucked up about the fact that Minwoo was on television on a weekly basis and that Sour Candy’s song had broken sales records, and yet his family were close to finding themselves in debt.

‘You'll start earning soon.’ Seobin had told him a couple of weeks ago, when Minwoo had gone to his office and asked when Sour Candy’s training debt would be cleared. But Minwoo had pushed. He doesn’t know where he got the bravery from; but something just wasn’t adding up. He was paid a monthly fee for appearing on Inkigayo. He had writing credits on two of the songs on a mini album which had charted at number one, and more to come on Sour Candy’s upcoming album, which was projected to be an even bigger smash. Even with Valentine’s state of the art equipment and highly respected coaches, Minwoo doesn’t see how much he could possibly have left to repay. Surely by the time Is… Anyone There? Was released, they’d be seeing some kind of royalty.

But Seobin had been cagey. He'd avoided giving answers, and confused Minwoo by talking in circles about percentages and quarters and taxes and redistribution of funds, and eventually Minwoo had just snapped and asked ‘well, how much did you make off of me?’

Seobin had played dumb, and started talking about Inkigayo. That was when Minwoo really lost it. He can barely remember what he said, just that he was shouting, and that he’d picked Seobin’s mug of hot coffee and flung it against the wall. It shattered, ceramic flying everywhere. Seobin had barked at him to get the fuck out- the only time he’d ever heard him swear. And when Minwoo tried to argue, he’d been warned that if he didn’t leave then there would be consequences for all four members of Sour Candy.

Underneath the anger, there was guilt on his face. Seobin seemed to know, at least, that he had made this monster himself.

Is… Anyone There? was dropping in a week, and Minwoo doubted he’d see any of its revenue. He'd avoided Seobin ever since that day, though. And he figured he shouldn’t ask about money again.

“I'm sorry.” Minwoo says. Minhyung looks at him questioningly. Minwoo regards him in his work uniform and it dawns on him that Minwoo had never had to work when he was in high school.

“What for?” he asks.

“I feel like I should be able to help. I'm a singer, you know? My family shouldn’t be struggling.” Minhyung shrugs.

“Things are fucked up for idols, hyung. Everyone knows that. Nobody blames you.” There’s a beat, and then he screws the lid back onto his styling gel and pushes himself up into his feet to put it away. “Besides, it was my fault they started fighting.”

“How do you figure that?”

“I asked them for money.” Minhyung sighs. “There's this trip being organised by the art department from my school. To japan, to go to all these galleries and then go visit a bunch of animation studios. I really wanted to go, but it’s five hundred thousand won.”

Minwoo purses his lips. It’s a lot of money, but Minhyung didn’t often ask for anything. And Minwoo can’t help the song of guilt he feels when he thinks about how much their parents had invested in his hobbies; the dance costumes, the lessons, the competition entry fees. Even their schooling; Minwoo had attended Hanlim, and Minhyung goes to to public school. It's not as if Minwoo would have gotten any of those things if the family were struggling then the way they are now, but he still knows it isn’t fair.

“Anyway.” Minhyung says. “I'm gonna be late for work.” Minwoo offers him a weak smile as he leaves, turning in his chair and making eye contact with the anime girl on Minhyung's mousepad.

“What do I do?” He asks, but neither she nor her cushioned breasts offer any advice.

“Good day?” Seungsoo asks. Minwoo clamours into the car with his grandma’s lipstick on his cheek and five containers of her cooking balanced delicately on his lap. The top one is packed full of kimchi and looks particularly delicious, though it’s specifically labelled with Jade’s name. Apparently, he’d said he liked kimchi on a tv show, and she thinks he’s too skinny. Jade has a body most people would kill for, but Minwoo will pass on her gift happily.

“It was great.” Minwoo says with a smile. “I got to see my grandparents for the first time this year. Thank you for letting me take the day off.”

“I think you needed it. I'm glad you had a good time with your family.” Seungsoo says, and it seems like he genuinely means it. There's a comfortable silence in the car, and Minwoo is full of his grandma’s cookies and sleepy from the soothing and familiar tone of his grandpa’s stories about being a teenager. And he’s mostly happy, for once. But something eats away at him, and he can’t just ignore it.

“Hyung…” he says. Seungsoo seems to know from the tone of voice that he’s going to ask for another favour, and quirks an eyebrow. Minwoo hesitates, and is about to tell him it doesn’t matter.

But he thinks about his family. He thinks about how they’re struggling, and he thinks about his duty as a son.

And as far as he knows, Seungsoo had been kept in the dark by Seobin on purpose. He thinks he can use that to his advantage. So he asks another favour.

“It has to be a secret..” He says. “But there’s a phone number I need you to get for me.”

0 notes

sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

007 : BAMBI.

Starring: Lee Bohyung.

Featuring: Lee Bohyung, Jade Lim.

Summary: Bohyung's mind wanders.

Word Count: 800.

CW: Sexual reference.

“I know it sounds like nothing.” Jade says. His voice is little more than a breath. They both lay under Bohyung’s blanket- appropriately distanced and dressed in their night clothes. It’s four in the morning and they have dance practice in two hours. They haven’t slept. Bohyung doesn’t mind though. A tear falls from Jade’s bambi eye, fanned on its journey by his long, fringed eyelashes. Through the gaps in their blinds, streetlights light the boy’s pretty face just enough to make it out. Bohyung reaches to cup his cheek, his thumb brushing away the tear. “I'm sorry.”

“It's okay.” Bohyung whispers.

“I replay that moment every night in my head.” Jade confesses. And he continues to speak, spilling his little heart out. Something only Bohyung could hear. Ever the confidante. Bohyung’s thumb strokes his cheek, and Jade leans into the touch as he talks. Bohyung thinks it may have been subconscious and he likes that. He likes that, maybe, Jade’s brain is pulling him closer. Somewhere in there might linger some sort of need for Bohyung that extends beyond a reliable friend and an ear to lend.

Bohyung had allowed Jade to make him into an emotional sponge. He can’t imagine it’s easy, to be swept up into this life. At first, as the eldest, he was happy just to listen to the new boy, to alleviate some of that insurmountable pressure that surely even shoulders as toned as Jade’s couldn’t withhold alone.

He can’t remember when he started sneaking glances at Jade’s lips, or his torso, or between his legs in grey sweatpants, and imagining being under him.

But his brain wanders, as it always does, to kissing away all of the pain on Jade’s pretty face, illuminated by streetlamps that Bohyung can imagine to be moonlight. He wonders what Jade would taste like. Even with the budget of Valentine Records and all the luxury fragrances in the world at his disposal, Jade still usually smells of a cheap strawberry body mist he’d been buying from the mall ever since high school, when he needed something strong and fruity to mask the scent of tobacco. Jade had told him that in passing, with a little laugh and the hindsight of ‘it definitely didn’t mask it, my mom still sniffed it out when she washed my school uniform. But I like the scent.’

Bohyung thinks that maybe it’s that, more so than Jade’s beauty. When it came to beauty, after all, Harin and Minwoo could easily match him, but they cared very much about it. They bought expensive clothes simply because they were expensive and took trips together to get fancy skin treatments that, as far as Bohyung could see, didn’t actually make any worthwhile difference to their skin, which had always just naturally seemed to be a hundred percent more perfect than his no matter what.

Jade put effort in- wore BB cream and spent time styling his hair in the morning, and he had a good sense of style. But he didn’t really care about the performance of it all. He’d wear t-shirts that he’d had since he was a teenager to the airport and be photographed in them without a second thought. Around the dorm, Harin and Minwoo styled their leisurewear as if they were about to go on stage in it; Minwoo, in particular, had been asked by Seungsoo to wear shorts that actually covered his ass cheeks more than once. If Jade didn’t have to go anywhere, he’d walk around in hoodies and pyjama pants.

It made the moments, like a few nights ago, when Bohyung had watched him do his makeup in the mirror before going out with his friends, all the sweeter, when Jade would don something skimpy (that night it was a tank top that was as tight as his skin, black and very translucent) and all Bohyung would be able to think about any time he closed his eyes was tearing it off of him.

By the time Jade is finished venting his woe that is only for Bohyung’s ears, Bohyung is thinking of running his hand to the back of his neck, pulling him gently in and taking him in a kiss; soft at first, though soon the passion would mount. He’d roll him onto his back, knees falling at either side of his hips. Kiss his way down his jaw, to his neck, and then collar bone, and lower still, till he’s tugging his t-shirt off and kissing down his abdomen. By the time his lips reached the waistband of his pyjama pants, he’d kiss back up. And then back down. Slowly. He wanted to feel Jade start to writhe underneath him. He wanted to hear him ask for it.

“Can you hold me?” Jade asks. He sounds small. Bohyung just raises an arm, and Jade pulls himself closer, head resting against his chest. Bohyung’s arm drops around Jade’s shoulders and pulls him close, giving him one quick little squeeze that Jade breathes out a little laugh to.

“Thank you, hyung.”

“For what?” Bohyung asks.

“Listening.”

0 notes

sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

006 : LIAR, LIAR, LIAR.

Starring: Jade Lim.

Featuring: Song Taejun, Cairo Go.

Summary: The tower begins to wobble.

Word Count: 2k.

CW: Drinking, sexual reference, NSFW dialogue, inappropriate relationship, age gap, minor physical harm.

Lately, Jade was spending more nights with glitter on his cheeks and bass sending shockwaves through his body than he’d really like.

Ultimately, he just wasn’t doing this to spend his life partying. He’d disrupted his whole life for this idol thing. He wants to do it properly, wants to be like Harin, spending days at a time in the studio, honing his craft. Every little gay boy dreamed about being a pop star one day (vast generalisation, but Jade is as gay as they come, so he can make those) and that had fallen out of the sky and into Jade’s lap. He’d like to give it his everything.

Instead he sits on the lap of song Taejun in yet another vip section, the man’s hand splayed across the back of his neck and his tongue down his throat.

He’s good at enjoying himself, regardless. As a child, Jade had built a technique, wherein on his third time lying to himself, he believed his lie. He’d say ‘I want to do my homework, I want to do my homework, I want to do my homework.’ And then he’d just do it, and it wouldn’t be that bad. He’s not, like, a psychologist. He doesn’t know if he’s actually placeboing himself or if he’s simply psyching himself up, but he’d done it his whole life. By the third time, he’d be fine. Earlier, he’d put a slutty little outfit on and looked at himself in the mirror and said ‘I want to go out, I want to go out, I want to go out,’ and by the third time, he did.

And he was having fun, until Taejun got bored of dancing and then got bored of drinking and then got bored of talking to his friends and then all there was left to do was kiss Jade.

It’s not that Taejun is a bad kisser; it’s just that he never really let Jade get into it before he got intense. Sometimes it was actually pretty nice just to be grabbed and kissed as if the world was ending, but there was a time and a place for that - and that isn’t when four of Taejun’s friends were sitting at the booth with them. They’re all engaged with their phones and their conversations- one of them is twisted over the sofa to yell back and forth to a girl who was way too pretty for him in another of the VIP booths, but he feels their eyes on him anyway. He’d caught one of them watching them kiss before.

He feels Taejun’s big hand sliding softly up his thigh, and he parts the kiss with a little gasp as it dips between his leg. He wraps his own hand around Taejun’s wrist, pulling his hand up and away, resting it on his waist.

“Baby.” Jade says in a voice that is as warning as it is gentle. There was a way to tell Taejun no, Jade had learned. Though he’d never made Jade do anything he didn’t want to do, Taejun, if not handled with velvet gloves, was prone to a sulking session that could last upwards of days when he felt rejected.

“Come on.” Taejun says, pulling his hand from Jade’s waist, once more dipping down to splay across his crotch. “Let me get you off. It’ll be hot.” he speaks in a murmur that Jade can barely hear over the noise of the club, but the embarrassment of someone potentially hearing that still runs hot through him. He screws his face up, trying to push himself off of Taejun’s lap. Taejun grips his hips and pulls him right back down.

“Please let go of me.” Jade says, voice firmer but still patient and level, even as his palms begin to sweat.

“I’ll do it quick.” Taejun says, leaning in to press a wet kiss to Jade’s neck. Jade’s palm spreads over Taejun’s forehead and pushes him back. Taejun fixes him with a glare, which spikes an irritation through Jade’s chest.

“I don't want to do that in front of people, hyung.” Jade says, with a forceful tone in his voice. He’d deal with a sulky Taejun if he had to, his patience could only stretch so far. “It's trashy.” something shifts.

“Trashy?” Taejun lets out a mean little laugh. His grip tightens, his palms digging into Jade in a way that hurts. There’s a weird look in his eyes, and Jade feels his pulse quicken just a little, because Taejun was supposed to be a predictable creature, and he had thought he would have just let him go. “You didn’t care about being trashy when you spread your legs for me the first time we met.”

“You’re hurting me.” Jade says, a mounting panic rising in him. Taejun is looking at him, but he’s not really looking at him. There’s an anger in his eyes that Jade has never seen. He wants to get away.

“You’re so fucking hypocritical.” he says. Jade would normally be bothered by the words, but he’s barely listening to him, gripping at his wrists and trying to pull his hands from his hips at such a force that his forearms begin to tremble. “Talking about trashy? Oh, if people knew the things you begged me to do to you last night-”

“Taejun, you’re seriously fucking hurting me!” Jade’s voice rises at the end of his sentence and he hears the conversation around him lull. For a second Taejun just looks up at him as if he’s thrown a glass of cold water in his face, and then his hands unclamp almost mechanically. He gapes up at him, lips flailing like a cartoon impression of a goldfish, but no words come.

Jade feels the tears prickle in his eyes, and he looks around at Taejun’s friends and all of them stare in silence, and he’s waiting for at least one of them to speak up, a ‘what the fuck, Taejun?’ would suffice. But each of them divert their eyes when Jade looks at them. He looks back at Taejun, and he’s going to say something but Taejun is staring behind him.

He looks like he’s seen a ghost.

Jade turns his head to the booth not three feet from theirs, and standing in the middle, watching with raised eyebrows, is a handsome face that Jade takes a few seconds to place.

Cairo Go. Leader of Polaris- a group that had sprung up out of nowhere with a sudden hit. They’d been hammered into Jade’s brain lately as target major; Sour Candy’s objective this coming comeback was to make everybody forget they ever heard Polaris’ record in the first place. Cairo catches Jade’s eye and offers him a wink, plucking a cigarette from behind his ear and popping it between his lips, stepping away from the booth and disappearing into the throngs of the club.

Jade pushes off of Taejun’s lap, finding space next to him on the uncomfortable faux-leather couch lining each booth. He wipes his tears away with the pads of his palm and looks at Taejun, who does not look happy in the slightest.

“Well. That’s it. We’re fucked.” Taejun says.

“Cause of Cairo?” Jade asks. He rubs his hip as subtly as he can manage, already accepting the fact that he’s not going to receive an apology nor explanation for what just happened. “What does he have to do with anything?”

“Are you stupid?” Taejun asks. It’s a question he’s asked Jade a thousand times, and would continue to ask no matter how many times Jade told him that that word cut deeper than most.

Once, he had watched Ikumi show off a purse to Harin, and in her excitement she had exclaimed ‘it's so pretty, like, are you weird!?’ Which was exactly the type of meaningless syntax and pointless hyperbole that Taejun loved to pick at Jade for using, but it helped to recontextualise his words through Ikumi’s filter. Ikumi, who had once looked at Jade in his stage outfit and said ‘you fucking cunt,’ and Jade had immediately understood it to mean ‘you look great.’ Ikumi didn’t ever speak to hurt Jade; the rougher her words, the higher the praise.

It’s a trick he had learned to make loving Taejun a little easier. At its core, he’s making believe that his boyfriend is nice to him. He doesn’t often think of it that deeply, though.

“No.” Jade says, pressing his tongue into his cheek. Taejun shakes his head, wiping his nose with his palm and leaning forward to take a drink of the beer he had mostly been ignoring in favor of Jade.

“He was announced as mc along with Minwoo and Chaerin today. You really think he wont tell them what he just saw?”

“We don't know what he saw.” Jade offers unsurely.

“Well, maybe he wouldn’t have seen anything if you didn’t start acting crazy and yelling.” Jade worries his lip, eyes flickering to the neon sign above the door that leads to the outdoor smoking area.

“Give me a cigarette,” he says. “I'll go talk to him.”

The VIP section was small, and so Jade isn’t sure why he expects its designated smoking balcony to be packed. Still, it’s a shock when he exits out into the cool spring night, wrapping his arms tightly around his body, protected by the chill only by a mesh tank top tucked into a pair of oversized jeans belted high on his waist.

He hadn’t imagined that only Cairo would be out here, but he’s met with nothing but the sight of his back as he leans over the railing of the balcony, puffing away at a cigarette.

Jade joins him, standing close, his bare arms resting on the cool metal bar lining the top of the railing. “Can I borrow your lighter?” He asks, though Taejun had given him his to use. It just seems like the type of thing you say to initiate a conversation in this situation.

Cairo neglects to look at him, blowing smoke from his nose, and then digs in his pocket for a plastic orange lighter. Jade takes it from him with a small bow and lights the cigarette Taejun had given him. He’d smoked in high school, but he’d long since kicked the habit. The first draw is comforting and familiar, even if the taste sticks unpleasantly in his throat and he knows he’s going to be smelling it on his fingers for a while no matter how hard he scrubs them.

“Sour Candy.” Cairo says.

“Polaris.” Jade responds.

There’s silence for a bit. Cars run through the streets, drunken students cackle and yell below them, the bass thumps inside. Still, Jade perceives it all as silence. It’s Cairo who breaks it.

“How old are you?” he asks.

Jade furrows his brows, taking a draw of his cigarette. “Twenty-two.” he says.

“Korean age?”

“Oh. No. Sorry, twenty-three, I think.”

“Foreigner?”

“American.”

“Right.” He says. “Jade. I remember you.”

Jade looks at him again, head tilting slightly. “From where?” He asks.

“I hosted a variety show you guys were on last year.” Cairo says with a smirk. He’s still yet to look to the side, yet to make any sort of physical acknowledgment of Jade’s presence at all. “Ah, you don’t remember meeting your seniors…”

Jade just snorts out a laugh. “I barely remember my debut at all.” He says. “It was a blur.”

Cairo nods in understanding. “So.” He says after another drag. He blows the smoke out with his words. “Tiny.”

Jade grits his teeth, cigarette finding place between his lips again. Cairo finally looks at him, and it’s with a snort. “What about him?” Jade asks.

“Cause for concern?” Cairo asks. He diverts his eyes again, and he speaks in a tone that tries too hard to be casual.

“What do you mean?” asks Jade, playing oblivious.

“You were all teary-eyed.”

“Well.” Jade takes a long draw, watching the smoke dissipate into the air as he blows it slowly out. He can feel himself sobering up; the cold nipping him through the see-through fabric of his tank top. “It’s not a party if nobody cries.”

“Cute.” Cairo says. “That’s not an answer.”

“Look,” Jade presses. He had his own internal investigations to do about whether or not he should be concerned about Taejun. Cairo really wasn’t who he wanted to talk to about that. “Could you not tell anybody that you saw us together tonight?”

Cairo breathes out another laugh, shaking his head. “Who would I tell, kid?” The pet name makes Jade bristle; as far as he’s aware, there’s only a couple year’s difference between them. But he says nothing, because he’s out here to ask a favour of Cairo. Conflict is the last thing he wants.

“My groupmate is going to be mcing with you. And so is my noona.”

“Ah.” Cairo gives him a knowing look, that’s followed by a smirk that makes Jade feel guilty over nothing. “So are you his dirty little secret, or is he yours?”

Jade screws his face up. “It’s not like that. It’s… we both agreed to keep it secret.”

“… So you make out in clubs?” Cairo looks at him with that look - one that Jade is well accustomed with. He looks at him as if he’s stupid. Suddenly, the walls go up. Though it’s half-smoked, he drops his cigarette from the balcony, to the city below, and stands up a little straighter.

“Well, his friends know, so-”

“But yours can’t?” Jade blinks.

His lips part in search of a response, but it doesn’t come.

“Whatever.” Cairo says, raising his hands. He stubs his cigarette out on the railing, flicking it down to the city in pursuit of Jade’s. “I won't tell your friends, kid.”

“Thank you.” Jade says. He scratches the back of his head, looking towards the door. “Are you coming back in?”

“Nah.” Cairo says. He pulls his cigarettes from his pocket, flicking it open and taking another. “I'll see you around.”

Jade rocks back on the soles of his feet, nodding a goodbye to Cairo tightlippedly before making his way to the door. Just as he pushes it open, Cairo calls, “hey, kid.” Jade looks at him with a raised eyebrow, and Cairo says, “I’m not gay, but you’re a handsome guy. You should get a boyfriend who actually claims you.”

And Jade plasters a smile on his face and says, “I stopped listening when you said you weren’t gay.” Offering a little salute, he falls back into the club and lets his face drop.

He pushes down the dread in his stomach when he thinks about going back to Taejun and convincing him that he’d fixed everything, but he thinks it’s mostly just because dealing with a drunken Taejun was just kind of exhausting. His hips had already stopped hurting, and he thinks about Cairo’s question and knows that there’s no cause for concern. Taejun loves him. He’s not scared of Taejun.

He’s not scared of Taejun.

0 notes

sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

005 : SOLITAIRE.

Starring: Kwon Harin.

Featuring: Song Taejun, Jade Lim, Hirono Ikumi, Kwon Ahin, Zhang Junjie, Tachikawa Tetsuo, Kim Seungsoo.

Summary: Harin goes to a party.

Word Count: 6k.

CW: Drinking, reference to drugs, NSFW dialogue, homophobic slurs, violence.

“You’re useless like this.” Taejun says. It could sound cruel, but he has a way of saying things that could sound cruel in a kindly way. He looks over with a grin. “Go home, Rin. You’re overtired.”

Harin sits back in his chair, anchoring his feet to the ground and twisting his waist, swivelling it from left to right just a little. He doesn’t look at Taejun, he just looks up at the ceiling, the tops of his vision eclipsed by the brim of his baseball cap. “I'll push through it.” He says, reaching out for the giant can of energy drink he’d rested on the soundboard. His hand doesn’t reach it, but he does hear the sound of metal scraping plastic. He looks down, and finds Taejun has dragged it out of reach. “Hyung.”

“You don’t need this shit. You need sleep.”

Harin rolls his eyes, pushing himself out of the chair. It’s true that he hadn’t been much help for a while; he thinks he’s on hour 32 of no sleep- but Sour Candy had a deadline fast approaching. A deadline that only Harin seemed in any way worried about meeting. Bohyung had dropped in to help where he could, but he just wasn’t very good at writing, and none of the lyrics he contributed ever made it into a final cut. Jade was still so new; he was still intimidated by the recording booth; and Taejun didn’t want to burden him with responsibilities he couldn’t handle until he was more comfortable. Harin was all for throwing Jade into the deep end and seeing how well he swam, but Taejun was insistent that it would only make him feel inadequate when he inevitably struggled with the process of songwriting.

If anybody was going to be a true help, it would be Minwoo. but Minwoo was never around these days. Harin tried to avoid thinking too much about that. Minwoo had always loved to party, always disappearing every night before a free day, but it had become way more frequent and something was definitely up. Minwoo refused to admit it, though, either laughing it off or getting annoyed and accusing Harin of smothering him. so what else could he do but give him space?

‘I don’t see the others boys around here much when they’re not recording,’ Seobin had muttered one afternoon, visiting the studios to check on the album progress. Harin had covered for them, offered excuses, and taken advantage of Seobin’s soft spot for him. But they were going to get themselves in trouble. Taejun’s executive producer role was only ever supposed to be temporary. Seobin’s vision was for Sour Candy to evolve into the next big ‘self-made’ group, and as things stood, that pretty much rested on Harin’s shoulders.

He stretches his arms out and twists at the waist, and his spine pops sickly disk by disk, cracking back into place. Taejun regards him with a grimace.

“You need a break.” He reaffirms. Harin scoffs.

“I didn't train for years for this job to not do it.” He combats, taking his jaw in his hand and pushing to the side, cracking his neck. Taejun visibly shivers.

Around hour forty, Taejun had jabbed him in the side and told him he could hear his snoring over the headphones, so Harin had finally agreed to go home and get some sleep in an actual bed.

That was the plan, anyway, but upon arrival, a cheerful Jade greets him from the kitchen, where a loud american pop song blasts over a bluetooth speaker, and an apron is double looped around his waist, flour coating every surface it could find.

“Whatcha making?” Harin asks, resting his chin on Jade’s shoulder as Jade stirs some kind of mix in a big bowl.

“Just cupcakes,” Jade says, not even blinking as Harin’s arms wrap around his waist. Jade loved touch and affection, and Harin enjoyed having a member around who didn’t make screwfaces and push him away whenever he tried to dish it. “I was gonna make apple pie, but Bohyung hyung said I bought the wrong kind of apples. You know there’s like, specific apples you’re supposed to use for cooking?”

“Yeah.” Harin says. “They’re called cooking apples.”

“Well it’s news to me.” Jade says with a sing-song intonation.

“i’m gonna go to bed.” Harin says. Without being asked, Jade wipes off a hand on his apron and reaches for his phone to decrease the volume of his music. Harin smiles a silent thank you. It’s certainly not new, by now, for him to come home in the afternoon and immediately sleep for around twelve hours. “Is Minwoo in our room?”

“I don't think so.” Jade says. He ceases mixing, and Harin lets go of him so as not to get in his way as he moves onto his next step. “I didn't hear him come home last night.”

Harin sighs, muttering a goodnight and making his way to his room. As he does, Jade lets out a little ‘oh,’ and calls him back into the kitchen.

“Do you want me to wake you in time to get ready for Daichi’s party?”

“That's tonight?” Harin asks, deflating a little. Now that they’d debuted, Sour Candy had been invited to their very first Valentine Records get together; this time hosted in Sakurai Daichi’s famously extravagant penthouse, in celebration of his twenty-ninth birthday. Harin knows he would regret missing it, but the exhaustion is heavy on his shoulders, and he knows that a few hours sleep won’t be enough. Still, as the leader, he can’t not show his face. “Sure. Thanks, Jade.”

Jade gives him a little smile and bids him goodnight, and Harin wonders how any of the last generation, who were once infamous for their partying, had the time for any of it. Before he reaches the door, he turns, and looks at Jade, singing pleasantly to himself as he pours his cake mix into their cases, and he makes a snap decision.

“Jade, don’t drink too much tonight.”

Jade’s head snaps to look at Harin. “Do I drink too much?” He asks, a look of concern on his face. Harin lets out a little laugh.

“No,” he says. “But i’m meeting Hayana noona in the studio tomorrow for a writing session. Nine AM. Make sure you’re up.”

Jade takes a second, and then a hopeful look dawns on his face. “Wait, you want me to come?”

“Yeah. You work well with her. And I'm determined to find the songwriter inside of you.” A smirk draws upon Jade’s face, and Harin can practically see the dirty joke brewing in his head. Harin rolls his eyes, interrupting him just as he opens his mouth to make it. “You know what I mean. Nine, okay?”

“Got it.” Jade says with a grin. “Thanks, hyung. I really appreciate it.”

Harin retires to his room, stretching out his muscles once more, stiff and sore from sitting in the studio for hours on end. He eyes Minwoo’s empty bed, unmade and messy, and he sighs. He picks up the mountain of Minwoo’s discarded clothes from the floor and dumps them all in the hamper, despite the fact that most of them are likely unworn, just held to his body and gracelessly tossed away when vetoed from the night’s outfit.

He’d been trying not to worry about Minwoo, but it was hard. With any luck, he’d just crashed at the Tarot dorm and lost track of time by side effect of sharing a bed with Tetsuo. That should comfort Harin, really, but it doesn’t.

He supposes that there comes a time in life where best friend inevitably takes the back seat to boyfriend, and Harin had always been aware of that in the vague sort of sense. In high school, it had happened to him over and over again, he’d befriend girls and embark on this weird, intense, parasitic best-friendship that sucked all of his sense of self out and replaced it with the role of sidekick. And he’d listen to their deepest and darkest secrets and comfort them through everything and neglect to point out that when they called themselves fag hags, they were indirectly calling him a fag. He’d revolve his life around being a good friend, and they’d get boyfriends and suddenly they didn’t need a gay friend to hang around with anymore, and they’d leave. And that had bothered him, but not like this.

Maybe it’s because all of those girls ended up with ugly boyfriends. He doesn’t exactly desire Tetsuo, but he does desire the concept that Tetsuo embodies; successful, gorgeous, fun, sweet. Minwoo had found the ideal boyfriend and Harin was, as always, pathetically alone. The only time he hadn’t been alone was when he was with jumin, and that was even more pathetic, in the end.

Harin struggles out of his skinny jeans and falls back into the bed, not bothering to go under the covers; it would only make it harder to get out of bed when Jade comes to wake him in a few hours.

He falls into a dreamless sleep, which is probably for the best.

It turns out that getting three hours of sleep after spending over twenty-four hours awake is more detrimental to a person’s energy than helpful.

From the second Jade had stirred him, Harin had awoken with a crushing headache. At one point, he vaguely considered going back to bed and just sending Daichi a late birthday card in the mail with an apology. But before he could, Jade had sighed in the kitchen, already all dolled up in his party clothes with his face made up, and said ‘Bohyung hyung doesn’t want to come.’

If Harin didn’t go, Jade certainly wouldn’t go alone, and he wasn’t going to be the one to ruin the youngest member’s plans for the night. ‘Oh well,’ he had told Jade. 'He's no fun anyway.’

And so Harin had swallowed down an aspirin or two and made himself pretty. He was the leader, after all. His job was to represent Sour Candy, this was equally true for parties as it was schedules.

It’s a grace that maybe he shouldn’t have upheld, because almost as soon as they enter the penthouse, lit up in deep pink light (which doesn’t exactly aid his headache) with music blasting so loud it rumbles the floorboards, Chaerin rushes screaming over and pulls Jade away somewhere, sparing Harin barely a glance in the process.

Jade, at least, has the decency to shoot a worried, apologetic glance over his shoulder as he’s pulled among the throngs of people in the hallway; but very soon, Harin is left alone.

He makes his way to the huge living room, and all but prays that Minwoo has somehow made his way here. For someone who shot to fame based on his charisma alone, Harin was, perhaps, a little socially awkward. He could radiate confidence with ease so long as he was performing, but being alone at a party was kind of his nightmare scenario.

He doesn’t know how to start conversations with new people; and with each passing second he feels more and more convinced that every single unfamiliar face he makes eye contact with is thinking about how he’s weird for being alone, and that every laugh is product of a joke about him he doesn’t hear. His head begins to hurt just a bit more, and he’s planning excuses to leave when an arm slots through his, wrapping tightly around his bicep, and he’s hit with a wave of flowery perfume trying desperately to mask the scent of marijuana.

“You look terrified.” says Hirono Ikumi, and Harin has never been more relieved to see her in his life.

“This isn’t really my comfort zone.” he says with a nervous sort of smile, and she snorts.

She begins to walk, and he follows though he doesn’t really know where she’s going. She leads him towards a huge dining table in a room that’s separated from the living room by a large, high archway. The table is packed with more booze and snacks than Harin thinks even a party big enough to fill this penthouse could consume; and he considers the decadence of Sakurai Daichi not for the first time. He had heard about the extravagance of his lifestyle, and the members of Tarot and Medusa had gushed to him about his parties. There was something a little odd, though, about seeing it all for himself. He wondered if one day, Sour Candy might reach the level of success that Histeria had. He can see Minwoo living a life like this very easily.

“Let's get you some comfort, then.” Ikumi says with a grin. She picks up two solo cups and begins gathering a seemingly random selection of bottles from the table. She immediately gets to work, though she does ask, “Do you like cocktails?”

“Yeah.” Harin says, feeling lucky that he does, because she wasn’t really waiting for an answer.

“I'll make you my famous cocktail.” She says, turning to look at him with an impish grin. Under the pink lights, he sees that her pupils are dilated. He wonders if she actually has any idea what she’s doing. “I call it the Hero’s Breakfast. Do you get it?”

“Yeah,” Harin says with a smile. “That’s cute.”

“It's cause my stage name is Hero.”

“Yeah, I know, babe.” Harin says, with a little laugh.

He distractedly pulls his eyes away from Ikumi’s alchemy, and through the archway into the living room room, he sees the familiar buzzed head of Tachikawa Tetsuo, perched on the edge of an armchair in which Zhang Junjie sits primly, eyes glued to his phone. Tetsuo is engaged in conversation with Kwon Ahin, who sits on the couch next to the chair.

“Ahin hyung’s over there,” Harin says in a way that he hopes seems casual. Ikumi’s head whips around to look, and she smiles toothily when Ahin seems to sense the eyes on him and waves over at them with a cheery grin.

“I'm going to inhale his cock tonight.” She says, factually. Harin snorts out a laugh, nodding towards her hand, which seems to be in suspended animation as it recklessly pours gin into the plastic cup, dangerously filling to the brim.

“You might want to chill out on the Hero’s Breakfasts, then.” He says. She makes a little ‘oh’ and pulls the bottle away, bending down to place her lips over the rim and sip away the excess.

Ikumi, deeming that her magic has been made, hands Harin the cup and demands they go talk to the Tarot boys. This, of course, had been Harin’s master plan from the second he pointed them out to her; because there was a lot to question Tetsuo on.

When they reach the boys, Ikumi heads straight to sit in Ahin’s lap. He wraps his arms around her waist and gives her a goofy smile. She leans in to kiss him, and Harin diverts his eyes, suddenly realizing the flaw in his plan. Now he’d have to pointedly ignore the affections of yet another happy couple, and think about how he’s alone. He takes a sip of his Hero’s Breakfast, and it takes all of his strength not to screw his face up in disgust as the realization hits that Ikumi had simply mixed together as many spirits as she could find and nothing else. He looks at her to complain but sees her taking a gulp of her drink with ease. In a way, he fears her.

“Hey, Harin.” Tetsuo says. Harin looks at him and smiles crookedly. Suddenly, he becomes extremely conscious of the fact that he’s just awkwardly standing; but to sit next to Ahin on the couch would be to place a wall of PDA between him and the person he was trying to converse with, so he sits down on the floor, resting his arm against the coffee table and hoping that that makes it look purposeful and not awkward. At the very least, nobody says anything or looks at him as if he’s an idiot.

“Hey.” Harin says. “Did Minwoo come?” There’s a pause in the conversation. An odd sense of discomfort dawns in Tetsuo’s posture, and Junjie looks up from his phone and settles his gaze on Harin’s face, something unreadable in his big, pretty eyes.

“How would I know?” Tetsuo asks. Harin stalls.

“He didn't come home last night,” Harin says. “I guess I just figured he’d be with you?” Junjie lets out a little snicker, returning to his phone, and Tetsuo elbows him with a hush.

“He didn't tell you.” Tetsuo deduces, pursing his lips into a line.

“Tell me what?”

“Minwoo broke up with me.” Tetsuo says in a matter-of-fact tone, before taking a swig of his beer that lasts a little too long.

“What?” Harin knows it’s not very tactful, but he can’t stop his jaw from dropping in surprise. “When?” he asks, before he can think.

Tetsuo sighs. “Last month. Look, bro, no offense, but I don’t really want to talk-”

“You’ve got to be fucking joking.” Junjie interrupts, harshly. Harin looks to him in shock, but Junjie isn’t looking at them. His eyes are pointed towards the center of the living room, behind Harin. Harin strains his neck to look; and immediately wishes he didn’t.

In the center of the room is, in the flesh, none other than Jung Jumin. And he makes eye contact with Harin, and then, like something from a horror movie, he begins to approach.

“He’s coming over.” Tetsuo says.

“Has he bumped his fucking head?” Junjie spits. He sounds livid. From her spot on Ahin’s lap, Ikumi gives Jumin a once over, her thick brush of false lashes fluttering in the process.

“Who invited him?” she questions.

“It must have been Daichi sunbaenim.” Ahin says.

“Has he bumped his fucking head?”

“He’s coming over.” Tetsuo stresses in a hushed tone, even though it’s not as if anyone could hear them over the music anyway.

Harin can barely even form coherent thought. He thought he had washed his hands of Jumin forever. He wrings his fingers, tearing his eyes away from Jumin and trying to push down the mountain of emotions threatening to bubble over the surface. He had kept everything to himself; the others have no idea. He’s going to have to act like nothing happened.

“Hey, Jumin.” Ikumi greets in a mellifluous type of way that immediately reads as fake. She speaks over the rim of her monstrous concoction, hiding her smirk. “Long time no see.”

“Hi, Ikumi.” Jumin says with a polite little bow, which she returns with a nod of her head. He looks across the rest of the group; Tetsuo offers a weak smile and Ahin manages one that looks real. Junjie doesn’t look up from his phone; and Harin’s pretty sure he’s just blankly staring. “Hi, guys.”

Everyone mutters back a hello, and Harin finds himself following suit. The only person who doesn’t say anything is Junjie, who’s thumbs fly across his keyboard at record speed. Tetsuo’s phone buzzes in his pocket suspiciously, several times in a row.

“Hello, Junjie.” Jumin presses, raising an eyebrow. Harin cringes.

Junjie looks up with a blank expression, through hooded lids that radiate a natural condescension. “Hi, adulterer.” He says, dryly.

An awkward silence falls over the couch; and a spike of panic strikes through Harin’s body. He looks up at Jumin with wide eyes; Jumin seems to catch it, glancing down at him and giving the smallest little shake of his head, seemingly unnoticed by the others.

“I know you don’t like me very much, Jun, but whatever happened between Shiyu and I doesn’t have to be between us-” Jumin starts, but Junjie lets out a scoff.

“I shared a womb with her,” He says. “I'm not going to be friends with you after you cheated on her.”

“Wait, what?” Ikumi cuts in. She looks at Jumin as if he’s a piece of dirt, all fake niceties immediately dropped. He bristles under her gaze. “You did what?”

“It’s a bit late for you to pretend you give a fuck about Shiyu now, Ikumi. I didn’t see you stick up for her when Valentine gave her the boot.”

“What power do I have over Valentine?” Ikumi snaps.

“And you’re no better.” Jumin ignores her, pointing his attention back towards Junjie. “Talk about family loyalty. If a label kicked my sister out and then threw her under the bus, the last thing I'd do is stick around.”

“How noble,” Junjie says with a roll of his eyes. “But I’m not letting anyone’s heterosexuality ruin my career.”

“Why do you guys always blame me?” Jumin asks, voice pitching upwards as he grows more and more defensive. . “None of you guys are in any position to judge. When they kicked us out, not one of you said a fucking word for us.”

“You’re the one who martyred yourself for a girl you apparently couldn’t even stay faithful to.” Ikumi scoffs, but Jumin is undeterred.

“And you’re nothing but a fucking hypocrite.” He says. “You told her that she just should have been more vigilant and here you are, sitting on a boy’s fucking lap. From what I’ve heard, you didn’t even learn from it, you didn’t get any more careful, Ikumi, you’re still whoring yourself out-”

Ahin makes to push himself from the couch in a flurry of movement, but Ikumi spreads her hand across his chest, pushing him back.

“Don’t,” She warns him.

“I’ll knock you the fuck out.” Ahin spits at Jumin. Jumin just raises his arms with a smirk.

“Strike a nerve, hyung?” Jumin smirks. Harin recognises it sickly, the smug pleasure Jumin seemed to gleam from finding out which buttons to press. For a second, there’s silence. Harin’s head hurts more than he thinks it’s ever hurt before. He takes a mouthful of the Hero’s Breakfast and grits his teeth with a grimace at its pungent, chemical taste. It’s not a good mix. He has no idea how everything suddenly flew off the handle.

It had always been awkward to bring up Jumin or Shiyu; but Shiyu was still Junjie’s sister, she was still connected. Nobody was really ready to see Jumin again. They hadn’t reached a consensus on him yet.

They all felt guilty about saying nothing. Of course they did, Jumin and Shiyu had been their friends. But Harin had, in a dark little part of his brain, felt a sick sense of victory when they were kicked out. He loathed Jumin, and he was ashamed to say it, but he loathed Shiyu too. They’d hurt him.

“First of all,” Says Junjie, pushing himself from the armchair. He makes his way to Jumin, getting in his space, their faces so close together that their noses nearly touch. The couch goes silent, and though the music still blares, it’s as if it’s drowned out. “Talk about Ikumi like that again, and I’ll knock all the fucking filler out of you. Second, literally nobody even wants you here, so I suggest you and your teeny tiny little needle dick get the fuck out, before you really get your feelings hurt.”

“Get out of my face.” Jumin says, in a warning tone.

“Why, what are you going to do?” Junjie simply asks, face splitting into a smirk.

“Get out of my face, you fucking fag-” It all happens so quickly that Harin barely even registers it. As if it’s nothing, Junjie’s small fist just drives out, striking Jumin right at the peak of his Adam's apple. Jumin stumbles backwards with a wheezing gasp, clutching at his throat as he begins to cough and splutter. Tetsuo is fast out of his chair; arms wrapping around Junjie’s biceps, gripping his arms tightly behind his back.

“Go ahead, finish your sentence!” Junjie shouts, staring down at Jumin, who continues to cough, gasping for air with a panicked look in his eyes as he flaps his lips wordlessly in shock. Junjie begins to jolt his shoulders, trying to pull free from Tetsuo’s grasp. “Choke it out, cunt!”

“Junjie, what the fuck-” Tetsuo groans out, through gritted teeth. He begins to drag him backwards, out of the living room.

“You’re surrounded by faggots, you fucking dumbass! They’re playing a fucking Charli XCX song!” Junjie calls as Tetsuo tugs him into the hallway. “What did you think was going to happen!?”

They disappear into the bathroom, and then all there is is the sound of labored breathing. And the Charli XCX song.

In a flurry that Harin’s not sure he even saw, Daichi is suddenly on the scene, putting a hand on Jumin's back, rubbing it with a worried expression on his handsome face. Harin barely knows where to look, from the shimmering, expensive looking tiara atop his head to the pink sash that boasts him to be the ‘World’s Oldest Twink.’ With an inappropriate burst of good humour, Harin can’t help but think that Junjie was right, Jumin really has picked the worst possible birthday party to throw homophobic slurs around in.

And then there’s this crushing realisation that Jumin is there, and he’s barely even looked at Harin, and he had called Harin’s friend (Maybe? He doesn’t really know if Junjie likes him, or is aware of his existence) a faggot, and he’d done it because Junjie is gay and Jumin claims not to be and he was trying to be hurtful.

And that’s when Harin understands, finally, the extent to which Jumin had used him. Harin had been nothing to Jumin. He was just a mouth. He’d loved Jumin; he’d loved him and so he’d never questioned anything; never wondered why Jumin would always close his eyes, or worse, watch porn on his phone. Never questioned why the only thing he ever wanted was head, why he’d never touch Harin back. He’d pretended it didn’t bother him, when Jumin would tell him to keep his hands off of him, say they were too big.

It all hits him like a train. Jumin hadn’t been two-timing him and Shiyu. He had been dating Shiyu, and using Harin to masturbate.

“Don’t give him any sympathy.” Harin tells Daichi. Daichi looks at him questioningly, and Jumin fixes his eyes on him, but Harin resolves not to meet them. He doesn’t care anymore.

“What the fuck happened, here?” Daichi asks, already drawing his hand away from Jumin’s back. He looks annoyed, and Harin can’t really blame him; a bunch of rookies had started a fight at a party they’d been lucky to be invited to in the first place.

Harin wants to explain, but his migraine suddenly feels like it’s splitting his head open, and with a groan he lets his head drop against the coffee table. He vaguely hears Ikumi and Ahin launch into explanation, he hears Jumin rasping out rebuttals, and he sees Daichi look more and more bemused by the whole thing, and then shoot a disgusted glare at Jumin.

He’s so tired, suddenly. His eyelids feel too heavy to hold open. He wonders if he’s drunk, but his hero’s breakfast is still pretty much full. He can feel the pink room growing darker, and he almost falls completely into sleep before a big hand clamps down on his shoulder. He looks up to see Jade, who gives him a gentle, careful smile. His shirt is slightly askew, and his hair is tussled.

“Seungsoo hyung is coming to get us.” he says. “Let's go wait outside for him.”

They sit on the cold pavement, Harin resting his head on Jade’s shoulder. The crisp air is enough to wake him up for now, and he vaguely watches his breath as it forms in the air in front of him, fading out into the world.

“Sorry you’re leaving early because of me.” Harin says with a sigh. Almost immediately, Jade shakes his head, nudging against his shoulder.

“There'll be other parties. Are you okay?” Jade asks.

“No.” says Harin. Jade’s arm shifts, and then it wraps around his shoulder, pulling him close to his side. Harin sighs. “I'm lonely.”

“You have me.” Jade says. “and the others. You have Minwoo hyung.” Harin smiles weakly.

“Yeah.” he says. “I guess.”

“What's making you feel lonely?” Jade asks. Harin frowns, wringing his hands.

“Everyone has someone but me. Ikumi has Ahin hyung. Minwoo has Tetsuo, Bohyung hyung has Chiwon hyung. You have your thing going on, where you sneak away all the time and limp home and think we don’t notice.” Jade lets out a snort, nudging Harin with his shoulder. Harin lets out a laugh of his own. “I dunno. I’m jealous.”

“You could have anyone you want, hyung.” Jade says. “you’re Kwon fucking Harin.”

“I’m not, though.” he says. “Not in real life. I’m not really who they think I am.”

“You are.” Jade says. “You’re cooler in real life.”

Harin sighs through his nose. They’re quiet for a while, watching the cars go by on the road. After a few minutes, Harin lays back, resting his head against the cool concrete ground, staring up at the sky. Jade joins him only moments later. They probably look way drunker than they are like this, Harin’s arm falling over Jade’s stomach and their knees bent, knocking together. They’re quiet. They just look at the sky.

“This would be better if you could actually see stars in Seoul.” Jade laments, after a while. Harin can’t help but laugh.

“Yeah. But maybe if we’re lucky, we’ll see a chemtrail.”

“That's all a load of garbage.” Jade says. “Lana's lost her mind.” Harin doesn’t really know what he’s talking about, so he doesn’t respond. He just thinks.

He thinks about how everyone has had an easier time bonding and fitting into the Valentine ‘family’ than he has. And then he feels bad, because he gets along with Taejun, and Ikumi had gone out of her way to make him feel a part of things tonight, and Tetsuo had called him bro, which might mean something. But then he thinks about Minwoo, who’s really the only true best friend he’s ever had, and how he didn’t even tell him about something as big as his relationship ending. A month ago.

And while he guesses that he’s maybe not entitled to every detail of Minwoo’s life, he’d certainly had to hear more about the grip strength of Tetsuo’s asshole than he’d ever like to know, so it’s not as if Minwoo has ever been private about his affairs.

He wonders if Minwoo is home yet, and where he’s been, and if this will ever pass or if it’s just another parasitic friendship that someone’s already grown out of even though Harin still desperately needs it to survive.

“That was the guy I replaced, right?” Jade asks. Harin feels a weird emotion bubbling in his chest.

“Yeah.” he says. “Jumin. The girl he dated is Junjie’s sister, so that’s what that was about.”

“I know.” Jade says. “Chaerin noona told me the story. Me and her were watching from the kitchen. Uh.. Are you okay, hyung? You don’t have to tell me anything, but you seem kinda shaken up.”

Harin turns his head, and Jade turns his too. For a second, he just stares into Jade’s big, pretty eyes, and then he gives him a tight smile. He can feel that he’s about to be too honest, and he doesn’t know what’s prompting it, be it Jade’s warm soul or the three mouthfuls of Hero’s Breakfast. Or maybe Jumin had just lost the right to Harin’s promises after calling his friend a slur. Either way, he tells him.

“I had a crush on him when we were trainees. It was really obvious, and he overheard Minwoo teasing me about it. One day, he and I got annoyed at Seungsoo hyung and we ran away from the dorm. We were hiding in Luke sunbaenim’s studio and we found weed in there, so we smoked some. He kept warning me that weed made him horny until eventually he just straight out asked if I wanted to suck his dick. I did, so I did, and then after that, even sober, every time he got in the mood he’d get me to suck him off. And he started being, like, especially nice to me, too. He treated me different than he treated Minwoo and Bohyung hyung.

“I was the naive one. I read signs that weren’t there. I even told people that he was my boyfriend. Then Dispatch leaked that he and Shiyu had been dating for a year. And when I confronted him, he was just like… it was just head. He made me feel really stupid about it all. He was using me to get off, that’s all. So seeing him was really hard. And then hearing him call Junjie that word…” Harin trails off with a sigh, staring at the murky, polluted sky above him. Jade lays his head on his shoulder, cuddling into him.

“So fuck Jumin.” he says. Harin snorts out a laugh.

“Yeah.” he says. “Fuck Jumin.”

“None of that is a reflection on you. You get that, right?” Jade says, a worry lingering in his voice.

“I mean, I was stupid enough to trust him.”

“No, you gave someone a part of yourself and expected them to treat it with the care it deserved. That’s normal, hyung. He’s the stupid one to exploit that. And if what you really want is to find someone who loves you properly, I promise you will. There must already be, like, boys lining up the block.”

“i don’t think there’s anybody interested in me right now.” Harin admits. “I can't even get a one night stand. I dunno, I guess compared to you guys, I just don’t feel, like, hot-”

“C’mon.” Jade scoffs. “If I wasn’t, like, staunchly against fucking my groupmates, I’d rail the fuck out of you right here on this sidewalk. In a heartbeat. Not joking.”

“Aaaand, there’s our headline.” rings out a third voice. Startled, Jade and Harin both push themselves back up to sitting position. Across the slim street stands a shadowy figure, leaning up against a black van, puffing cigarette smoke. Harin feels a sharp panic drive into his chest, but then his eyes adjust and he realizes that it’s just Seungsoo.

“When did you get here!?” Jade asks, bewildered.

“Jade, please don’t tell me you’re having public sex.” Seungsoo says, flicking his cigarette to the pavement and stubbing it out. “Even Valentine can’t bury a scandal like that.”

“Of course I’m not.” Jade scoffs, pushing himself to his feet and extending a hand to help Harin up. He looks at Seungsoo with a cheeky grin, and adopts an arch tone. “I'm a virgin.”

Harin rests his head against the plush seat of the van and closes his eyes. Seungsoo is a smooth driver, and Harin always found it easy to fall asleep in the back of this van. He thinks about how it’s been two days since he last got more than a couple hours rest and he’s desperate for some more, but just as he’s about to fall into slumber, Jade speaks again.

“What about Daichi sunbaenim?”

“Huh?”

“You should hook up with Daichi sunbaenim!” Jade says, eyes sparkling in genuine excitement at the idea of it.

“Jade.” Harin says, dryly. “Have you ever held the negative ends of two batteries together?”

With a sigh, Seungsoo reaches back to sharply slide the partition behind the driver’s seat closed.

“Oh.” Jade says, with a laugh. “Well, he’s so fucking pretty… can I tell you a secret?”

“Sure.”

“He was talking to Chaerin noona and I earlier, and he asked me if I wanted to make out with him.” Harin turns to look at Jade, at his giddiness, and he feels something weird tugging at his heart. There’s an innocence about Jade. It goes hand in hand with his worldliness. A weird paradox of someone who barely trained; Jade hadn’t yet been beaten down by the industry, but he’d lived in the real world, worked a real job, and so he’d been hardened by life in a way that the rest of them, hidden up in the steel Rapunzel tower that was Valentine Records, likely never would. And yet, Jade’s heart was raw and untainted and ripe to be feasted upon.

“Did you do it?”

“No.” Jade says, uncharacteristically quiet and after a short pause. Harin, once more, takes note of his messy hair and half-untucked shirt and narrows his eyes. “I'm kind of committed to something.”

“Right.” Harin purses his lips. Jade’s secret relationship. He breathes in through his nose, nodding his head. “Look, Jade… by all accounts, Daichi sunbaenim is harmless. But be careful of these older guys, okay? Especially the ones in the industry. Especially the rich ones. Some of them are gonna see someone as good looking as you, and hear your story and think you’re an easy target.”

Something dark and complicated crosses Jade’s face; he doesn’t let his smile drop, but he’s always betrayed by those big eyes of his. “I can look after myself, hyung.” he says.

“I know.” Harin says, frowning. “I'm just saying. Be careful.”

Jade settles back into his chair, folding his arms and looking out of the window. Harin rests back too, letting his eyes flutter closed.

He doesn’t know if Minwoo will be there when they get home; but the oppressive exhaustion weighing his bones down makes it hard to care.

Besides, he thinks, he’s spent his whole life worrying about others. Maybe it’s time he sorts himself out. Maybe it’s time he was selfish. Maybe it was time he put himself first.

If nothing else, it’s time he slept.

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sourkive · 1 year ago

Text

004 : EASY.

Starring: Kang Minwoo.

Featuring: Tachikawa Tetsuo.

Summary: Minwoo doesn't deserve easy anymore.

Word Count: 800.

CW: Sponsorship, trauma response, sexual reference.

Tetsuo is kind of an easy fuck.

Minwoo knows that he’s probably an asshole for thinking that about him. But he also knows that it’s something Tetsuo owns, in a way. Also, Tetsuo is Minwoo's boyfriend, so he can get away with it.

They’d both been fucking other people, but they’d agreed that that was okay. As long as they were honest. There didn’t need to be details or anything, nor any running commentary. But if Tetsuo asked ‘did you go home with that guy last night?’ and Minwoo had gone home with that guy last night, he’d say yes. And things were simple, so Minwoo asked Tetsuo to be his boyfriend and they’d adapted to that easily.

Tetsuo also kind of has a room to himself, which was easier than sneaking boys into his dorm and trying to get some action with Harin in the bottom bunk. Tarot were richer and a tiny bit more famous than Sour Candy, and Junjie had already moved into an apartment of his own, for the most part. On nights where Minwoo could stay, Tetsuo would push Junjie’s deserted bed against his, and if they ignored the uncomfortable gap between bed frames in the middle, it was like having a double bed.

It was kind of pointless. If they wanted to cuddle, it was more comfortable to do it on one side or the other. The one time they attempted to have sex in the middle, Minwoo had fucked Tetsuo so hard that the force had been pushing the bed frames apart again, and Minwoo was genuinely scared as they tumbled to the floor in the throes of passion that his dick might snap off in the fall.

It was a funny memory, but not one they were willing to repeat. They ended up on the same side of the bed every time anyway, but Tetsuo still pushed them together. Minwoo did like it. It made him feel like they were a real couple. Real adults.

Minwoo always felt safe in Tetsuo’s makeshift queen bed, in Tetsuo’s arms. They’d known each other forever, and Minwoo just didn’t think Tetsuo had it in his heart to hurt anybody. Tetsuo was easy. Not in a bad way. He was just easy. Easy to get in bed, easy to talk to, easy to relax around, easy to love. And Minwoo, for as long as they’d been a thing, had been easy back. And things had worked, and they’d been easy.

But then Minwoo changes, and suddenly every time Tetsuo wraps his arms around his waist without warning, he tenses up. He backs away from every sudden kiss, and when he opens his eyes when they fuck and looks down at Tetsuo, eager to see the way his face always warps in pleasure and his heavy eyebrows furrow, there’s a few seconds where he sees him. Old, ugly, and skeletal, rubber skin pulled drum-tight over his face. And by the time he’s Tetsuo again; beautiful, perfect Tetsuo who’s always been too good for him, Minwoo has already flinched away, scrambling to the bottom of the bed with tears in his eyes.

“Baby,” Tetsuo says, grimacing as he pushes himself up into a sitting position. His buzzed hair is growing out just a little too much, and the static of it rocking against the pillow case has stuck it up at odd ends. He regards him with a worried expression, pulling the bed sheet over his chest as if Minwoo didn’t see him naked more often than clothed. Minwoo watches him struggle to find the words, but eventually he begins to ask, “Did something…”

He trails off, clearly unsure of how to finish. He doesn’t have to, because Minwoo’s lungs fill with water and he splutters, and before he can truly register what’s happening, he’s sobbing into Tetsuo’s chest, body trembling as Tetsuo wraps his arms tightly around him, stroking his hair and hushing him, promising that it’ll be okay. Promising that he loves him.

Minwoo gives himself the time he needs to cry. And he lays awake all night with his eyes open, pulled tight against Tetsuo’s chest, listening to his heart beating. Eventually, he pulls himself out of a sleeping Tetsuo’s arms, and picks his clothes from the messy floor. and when he’s dressed, he tears a page from the back of the little diary Tetsuo keeps under his pillow, and writes;

“I need some space. sorry.”

Minwoo can’t bring himself to tell Tetsuo what he did. And they’d promised they always would.

So he doesn’t get to have it easy anymore.

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sourkive · 1 year ago

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003 : LAMB TO THE SLAUGHTER.

Starring: Kang Minwoo.

Featuring: Yoo Seobin, Jung Myeongjae, Kwon Harin, Lee Bohyung, Jade Lim.

Summary: Minwoo's worth is determined.

Word Count: 2k.

CW: Sponsorship.

Minwoo doesn’t know why, but nerves grip his stomach as he stands in front of Seobin, head hung, awaiting the other to speak.

It’s not his first time being called to the CEO’s office, but something is off this time. Seobin had always been friendly with Minwoo; and now, after so long at the company, they generally spoke to one another comfortably. There was still a level of respect expected, of course, but Minwoo was a teenager when he’d first met Seobin. They’d gotten familiar.

Minwoo isn’t sure what he might have done wrong, but he knows he must be in trouble. Seobin can’t even look him in his eyes.

“Is everything okay?” Minwoo finally asks, after what seems like five minutes of staring at his shoes, listening to Seobin shuffle things on his desk and clatter on his keyboard in silence. there’s another moment of silence, before Seobin sighs from his nose.

“Minwoo,” he says. He pauses again, and when Minwoo looks up, Seobin directs his line of vision away, swallowing roughly. “Sit down.”

Minwoo does as he’s told. And though there’s no way he could possibly be kicked from the group so soon after debut, not with the mad dash to prepare Jade after Jumin left, he can’t help but worry that this is it. Seobin stares past him, making eye contact with the wall behind him, and Minwoo just knows that Seobin is going to tell him he has to leave the group.

He doesn’t know what he’s done wrong. He’d been partying a lot lately, but he’d been careful. He’d been smart about it, stuck with friends who had more to lose than he did, never teetering too close to the edge of a VIP section. He'd never been caught, it can’t be that- but it has to be something.

“Are you kicking me out?” He blurts out. Seobin looks at him with a questioning furrow of his eyebrow.

“What? No. No, it’s nothing like that.” He says, wringing his hands. Minwoo is at a loss, then, and when he looks at Seobin expectedly, he’s greeted with another sigh.

“Sir.” Minwoo says, his thumbnail finding place between his teeth. “You’re kinda scaring me.”

Seobin runs a hand over his face, and then clears his throat. He’s uncomfortable and nervous and it’s terrifying. Minwoo thinks he’s going to learn that someone’s died, or taken ill, but Seobin just says. “I have a friend. Do you know Jung Myeongjae?” When Minwoo shakes his head, Seobin sighs. “He's a really important connection to Valentine. He owns a broadcasting station.”

Minwoo doesn’t get it. “Okay?” He says. Seobin finally looks at him, regards him with a complicated expression and guilt in his eyes. Minwoo shuffles.

“He saw you boys perform, and he’s a fan. He'd like to meet you."

Minwoo’s teeth break the nail, and he pulls it from his mouth, letting it hang for now- it would feel rude to pull it off. "Like, meet Sour Candy?” He asks.

“No.” Seobin loses eye contact again, shuffling through some paperwork, and Minwoo sees his hands tremble. “Just you."

Minwoo isn’t stupid, but he does have hope.

Jung Myeongjae wanted to have dinner with him. It seemed strange, but he owned a broadcasting station. Minwoo had worked really hard on trying to keep Sour Candy’s YouTube show entertaining, so he thinks that maybe it had caught his attention. In the lead up to the dinner, Minwoo entertains himself with the idea of being a Music Show host.

It would be hard to juggle with Sour Candy’s schedules, but it would probably be fun, and it wasn’t like he was about to pass up on an opportunity to be on television on a weekly basis. He does, briefly, wonder if Myeongjae wouldn’t have just gone through his management to hire him for that, but Minwoo doesn’t really know how this stuff works. Maybe this is all actually very normal.

The thought splinters a little when it’s not Seungsoo who comes to pick him up. They send Yoojung, instead. He was an older guy who had been with Valentine since the very beginning. Yoojung once worked as part of Histeria’s management team, but nowadays he wasn’t really attached to any group. He just kind of did Seobin’s bidding.

Minwoo asks him what restaurant they’re going to, and he’s told a name that he knows belongs to a hotel. However, he rationalises, hotels tend to have restaurants, too. Especially fancy ones. It isn’t too left field. In the car, he pictures his name in the roman alphabet, and what colour of microphone he’d like it sprawled on glittering cardboard across. He wonders if he gets to choose. He wonders who his co-hosts might be, and if the hosts on these shows actually befriend each other the way it seems. He could use some more friends. That would be nice.

Yoojung tells him to knock on the door of room 337 three times. Minwoo gets out of the car alone, and when he ducks back in to ask ‘aren’t you coming with me?,’ Yoojung at least has the grace to look guilty when he shakes his head no.

"I’ll be waiting right here.” He says, voice gentle in a weird sort of way that doesn’t suit him.

Minwoo isn’t stupid. By the time he’s knocking on the door, he’s steeled his nerve for what’s coming.

Jeong Myeongjae opens the door in a suit. Minwoo had wore a pair of slacks and a fancy designer t-shirt, but he still feels underdressed. He hugs his arms as he bows.

“It’s nice to meet you.” Minwoo says, in the hyper-formal manner he’s been conditioned to speak to important men in. “My name is Kang Minwoo."

Myeongjae laughs, putting a hand on Minwoo’s shoulder and ushering him into the hotel room, closing the door behind them. It thunks in a way Minwoo knows to mean it’s automatically locked. "I know who you are. Didn’t they tell you i asked for you specifically?”

Minwoo nods. The room is dim, but he can still make out Myeongjae’s face. His skin is pulled tightly over his skull, with the rubbery sort of sheen that old people get when they fight too hard not to look old. Minwoo thinks of his nose job and his shaven jaw and wonders if he’ll look like Myeongjae one day.

“My CEO told me you were a fan of mine.” Minwoo says. Myeongjae runs a hand down his arm, and when it brushes over his sleeve and reaches his skin, Minwoo does his best to push back an overwhelming sense of repulsion and a need to get away. “He said you liked our performance. Thank you.”

Myeongjae gives him a kindly smile, but there’s a dirty glint in his eye that churns Minwoo’s stomach. “You’re sweet,” he says. Minwoo bows his head again, a quick action, a non-verbal thank you. “I paid a lot of money for this night with you, Minwoo. You’d better be worth it.”

Myeongjae's hand closes around Minwoo’s wrist, and he leads him to the bed. And Minwoo has to wonder how much Valentine Records had determined he was worth.

Sour Candy bow ninety degrees to Seobin, sweat dripping from the peaks of their faces and matting their hair to their foreheads. He had sat in to monitor the rehearsal for their new title track choreography; and Minwoo thinks they had probably run through it about thirteen times before he’d finally stood up and told them to take a break.

Minwoo had outdanced them all. He doesn’t say it to be arrogant, he just knows it to be fact. He always did.

“Jade.” Seobin says with a grin as they stand up straight. “You’ve come leaps and bounds in the past couple of weeks. Really good work.”

Jade bows at the waist, again. “Thank you so much, sir.” he says.

“Bohyung,” Seobin continues, making his way down the line as he always did. “You’re not quite hitting some of the moves as sharp as the others, but I'm not worried about you. Just pay more attention to detail."

"Yes, sir. Thank you.” Bohyung says with a bow of his own.

“Harin, perfect as usual.” Seobin says with a broad grin. Harin matches it, not bowing as deep as the others.

“Thanks.” He says. beside him, Jade snorts out a little laugh, too quiet for Seobin to hear across the dance studio. It’s still new to him, but Bohyung and Minwoo had had years to grow accustomed to the princely treatment of Harin at Valentine Records. It had once annoyed Minwoo, but it’s not as if Harin didn’t have the skill and charisma to back it up. He’d somehow managed to not let it get to his head, and Jade was easy going enough to mostly just find it funny.

Seobin’s eyes fall on Minwoo, and for a second, his smile drops. Minwoo meets his eyes and sees guilt. “Minwoo.” He says. “Can I have a word with you in private?"

The boys give him a look, and Bohyung gives him a wordless clap on the shoulder that Minwoo has learned means 'good luck.’ They have no idea what Minwoo did last night. Minwoo will never tell anybody what he did last night.

"Are you… okay?” Seobin asks, as they step out into the hallway. Minwoo just nods, shoving his hands into the pockets of his sweatpants. Seobin stares at him for a few seconds, as if he’s expecting him to crumble. Minwoo didn't. He'd come home last night and taken a long, scalding shower. And when he went to his room and Harin asked him where he’d been, he’d just answered 'out.'

Minwoo had been partying a lot recently. He'd been hooking up a lot, too. None of the other boys had even questioned that he was gone, because he tends to be, these days. And so he doesn’t have to tortue himself over this. If he recontextualizes the whole thing, if he tries really hard, it doesn’t have to be any different than any of the other meaningless, faceless men he’d been going home with.

“If you need…” Seobin trails off. He's uncomfortable again. It's weird. Minwoo had always known him as stoic, authoritative. it’s disarming to see feelings on him. “If you need a day off, or to go home early, if you’re sore-”

Minwoo suddenly recognises the discomfort as a straight guy talking about gay sex thing, and shakes his head. “I’m not. It’s not, like…” He trails off, hoping that Seobin will get it. He looks at him with a tilted head, and Minwoo sighs. He doesn’t know why he’s saying this. He doesn’t think you’re supposed to be an idol and tell your CEO that you’re gay. “It wasn’t my first- I know how to, like… not be sore, after.”

Seobin purses his lips, and takes a slow nod, paired with an inhale through his nostrils. “I didn't know you…” trailing off, he puts his hands on his hips, and says. “Well. That's fine.Just be careful with that.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And you’re really okay?” He asks. Minwoo really just wants him to go away.

“Yes, sir."

Seobin utters an awkward goodbye, and sets off down the hallway. Minwoo watches him leave, and he doesn’t exactly know what comes over him, but before he can question it, he calls out; "Sajangnim?”

Seobin turns around quickly, making his way back down the hallway. “yes?"

"I'd like…” Minwoo doesn’t know if what he’s about to request is something he really wants, or if it’s just a way to look back on this in the future and pretend about how things really went, as if there’s any gain for him here. But he asks anyway. “If you see any openings, I'd like to give hosting a try. Like, on music shows."

Seobin nods. Minwoo knows he’s not supposed to straight up ask for things like that, but he figures Seobin probably owes him, and Seobin seems to agree by the way his features soften, and he nods. "I can get that for you.”

“Thank you, sir.” Minwoo says, spreading a hand on the swinging door back into the dance studio. Before he can escape, Seobin speaks.

“Minwoo… I'm sorry. I promise you’ll never have to do anything like that ever again.” He says.

Minwoo just nods, and enters the dance studio.

He’s happy to put a door between them.

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